


And then there is...

by Out_Of_Custody



Category: DCU, Green Lantern - All Media Types, Justice League - All Media Types, The Flash - All Media Types
Genre: AU, Ficlet Collection, Halbarry - Freeform, M/M, Shenanigans, this will take a while
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-02-17
Updated: 2017-03-07
Packaged: 2018-09-25 03:21:24
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 7
Words: 35,018
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9800576
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Out_Of_Custody/pseuds/Out_Of_Custody
Summary: ... the collection of fics ranging from short to long that I simply couldn't resist starring Barry and Hal as main-ship in all sorts of situations, roles and circumstances (therefor also all kinds of ratings!!)





	1. ...the one where Barry is a Blue Lantern (T)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> ... in which Barry is as much Hal's refuge as Hal is his Hope and they are the galaxy's best team-up

+++

 

Oa is always good to see these days; almost as good as Earth though he can’t clearly remember when he has last set eyes on it from up close – if he thinks hard he can almost remember the rays of the sun tickling his bare skin, warming and tanning him with its gentleness. Because while he has learned that there are a million other suns, too, somehow they can’t quite compare to his memories of his Earthen Sun.

_At least… not counting Odym… but that might be for another reason._

The Guardians are mostly content, if he hasn’t completely lost his touch in reading them – he’s been gone for a while so it might actually be a concern, but they don’t detain him for another mission briefing that would be sending him off to Lord-Knows-Where right away so Hal takes what he can get.

And that is food; for starters.

Not that the host-planet he’s been deployed to on his last mission has been lacking in their duties; on the contrary. He has been offered everything that their apparently selective cuisine has to offer – but even as a Space Cop his intestines are human and some things… he can literally not stomach. As, apparently, much of the cuisine on _Ahair_. They have found a compromise in which Hal has been given what adds up to Fledgling Nourishment if he understands correctly to ease him into the alien understanding of food – to an extent, it worked.

He’s still very happy to have the good-old GL-cantina-grub though.

The Corps are amiable despite not really knowing each other, given the fact that they are so unbearably large – but there is always a known face to raise a hand to in greeting and to garner a smile from, heartfelt even if tired, beaten up, cocky or overzealous.

This is almost coming home.

 _Almost_.

When he first came to Oa the food was unbearable; slimy, gooey, barf-coloured with pink unidentifiable bits in it and Hal couldn’t, for the life of him, overcome the smell of it. He’s gotten better about it – obviously – and when he sits down in a cornered niche that he has been occupying since his second year as a Lantern, Earth Years, it almost tastes like something he’s had his whole life.

Curious what the human mind can get accustomed to.

He is not disturbed while he eats. Kilowog, if his intel is not outdated, takes this time of day to hunt the new recruits through a Route March that Hal is only somewhat guilty of being the reason for. His comrade had been very interested in the formation procedures of Earth Military and Hal has only noticed too late that _curiosity_ wasn’t all there was to it.

Then again, even John has reported a somewhat higher respect towards Earthen humans ever since the first graduates came out of that program, so maybe it did some good too. Can’t make an omelette without cracking a few eggs.

He stays on-planet for the night, despite the fact that his quarters feel bleak to him, even with his favourite fleece comforter – imported from Earth, he had almost not been able to believe that _Fleece_ was what nearly set the Oan Toll-Office into a frenzy because they _didn’t_ _know it and is it dangerous_ – but sleep beckons and if he’s honest, he has quite the debt to catch up on in that regard.

So he settles on the mattress, not too soft, not too hard and mindfully asks his ring to please power down the suit so he could get undressed.

It’s, frankly, something he hasn’t quite grown out of – wearing actual clothes under his uniform. During his days in the Air Force wearing something else but the standard-issue jumper and the boots might have been considered actual heresy, but _they_ weren’t bound to the strength of a more-or-less-mystical object and could not disintegrate when said object was not in his near vicinity.

Guy has had some story about a run in with Sinestro on that account and boy, Hal might be comfortable in his birthday-suit but there were _lines_.

The ring retracts his uniform, melting the molecules back into their original form, leaving him in worn jeans, beat-up combat-boots that his Drill Sargent would have his head for if he ever saw their state, and a thermal undershirt that The Bat had forwarded him during his last stint with the JL. It was almost thoughtful of him and Hal could always bear to have a few more layers under his uniform – Space got cold.

He sheds his clothing; doesn’t care where it drops because he’ll have to do maintenance in the morning either way so why really bother, and slips under the fleece first, wrapping it tightly around his naked form before reaching for the fluffed duvet – equally imported, because he might have given up on most of his indulgences but sleeping comfortably was a hedonist streak he’s not about to give up in his technically-home – and pulls it high up on his body until his shoulder is safely ensconced and he can already feel the heat trapping inside his cocoon.

Hal turns to observe the small room, watch the colours of the stars – so close – dance over his off-white floor that seems almost blue. It’s the blue that soothes him, bleached out in light until it’s almost white, but not quite, clinging onto the last shreds of blue that he could almost believe…

 

-

 

When he wakes, the next day, morning has already passed; he knows this because he had been first roused from slumber when there was a minor commotion in the hallways of the Barracks indicating the number of workers and Lanterns that rose at a particular time to go about their duties around Oa. Hal had turned around on his mattress, hitched the blanket higher and burrowed back into the land of the nod with the kind of determined will only a Green Lantern could possess.

But his clock is telling him that it’s close to Noon by now and he has some getting ready to do.

He stands sluggishly, reluctantly, Fleece secured around him as he emerges from his blanket heap to stall the slight chill that accompanies leaving the bed – throw around him, he pads towards his bathroom, finding his duffel on the way and shoving it in front of him with his feet towards his destination.

While the bathroom is barely a cubicle, shower, sink and wash-a-tron – it has a name Hal is too sleepy to spell correctly – it is blessedly warm and private, enough for him to relinquish his cover before he even reaches for the tabs of the shower. It’s curious and strikes him time and time again that no matter how far and wide he travels, regulating water always resorts to similar techniques; the fittings might change, look differently, demand a different handling, but in the end it always boils down to similar techniques.

The mirror over the sink fogs up pleasantly as the steam of the shower permeates the air around him, warms and moistens his skin and opens his pores until the dirt and grit he’s been able to forget about yesterday starts itching again and Hal decides that he needs his shower now and brushing his teeth would need to come second.

But because the spray of actual water is too comfortable to get out of once he’s ensconced in it and washed, shaved and clean to his sometimes a little overbearing hygienic standards, he plops himself into a Turkish Seat under the downpour and fiddles his toothbrush and –paste out of a side-compartment and brushes his teeth then and there; relishing in the warm water pouring down his back.

Granted his indulging takes up another hour or so of his already late day, but he thinks that, given his recent Hail-Marys across the universe, he is allowed to have a day for himself.

_Or a week_

And he emerges from his bathroom a new man, shaved, shorn and clean, half of his duffel-bag already emptied into the washing and only returning to his chambers to get his clothes from the day before. They are in need of washing at least as direly as he has been and for a few moments he dithers about whether or not to give his bag the same treatment before he thinks why not and puts the sturdy material into the automaton with the rest of his dark clothing of which there is a surprisingly large amount. He’s just lucky that his uniform doesn’t need the same caring for.

Instead of waiting for the automaton to finish, he leaves his quarters to go in search of something that might pass as breakfast and while he thinks he might actually kill for some real, Earthen coffee in Space, the cantina offers a facsimile that kicks him awake just as good.

It, finally, gets his gears running.

If he can, he wants to visit Odym before going on his next mission and the Guardians have not made any indications that they will need him for some special Hal Jordan Diplomacy any time soon so it might just be in his cards. In urgent cases, the ring alerts him either way and he knows better than to even try and ignore a call of action – not that he would even toy with the idea, loyalty to the military forces he serves has been instilled into him since he was eighteen.

But before… maybe he should make a short detour…

 

-

 

_What do you hope for?_

He sits, listens to himself, plucks apart dreams for the hopes buried in them and distils them until only the most sincere remain.

The well-being of every entity in the universe, for one.

_Every single one?_

Yes; ultimately. Stripping away any personal grievances he has, he knows that even the darkest and most wretched of them exists in a quest for universal balance. So, yes, the well-being of every entity in the universe.

His chest feels light at the admission, warm and giddy and he doesn’t stop the serene smile that spreads on his face – allows for the tranquil emotion to flood his body and sway his heart gently.

_What else do you hope for?_

A balanced universe. Because that’s where he’s been going before and a balanced universe means the continued survival of a billion races.

And he loves the many people of the planets and the ships, the many creations by their hands or the hands of their god-like entities; he loves hearing about them and learning about them and sometimes even finding them and merely communing with them on a deeper level, connecting. It is a deep if curiously detached sort of love that allows him to feel this way, but none the less warm and rousing, enthusiastic in its existence and he swears that, for a few moments, he floats with the sensation.

_What do you hope for?_

That the Green Lantern Corps find themselves in perfect health and harmony, willing to step in for what has been decreed _right_ by the Intergalactic Council and willing to stall in moments of inequality even if the Council has decreed differently.

Because as brash as the Green Corps can be, they have a monumentally important role to play in the balance of the universe that he loves so much and he is well aware of the personal sacrifices almost every single one of their officers bear in order to fulfil their duties.

_What do you hope for?_

He hopes for the safety of his Corps, for their health and happiness, because they are his family now when he hasn’t had one for so long and they have mended the cracks in his heart and his soul with gentle words and touches, showing him a new way, letting him know of his worth with the honour they have bestowed unto him.

_What do you hope for?_

That Hal Jordan would hurry up already, because he can’t wait to see him again.

 

-

 

It takes him another day before he can finally and in good conscience start his trek towards Odym. His duffel is full of washed clothing, his fleece and a few presents that he is rather certain will not be ill-appreciated; slung over his upper body as he travels towards Oa first, allowing the Tolls to take in and catalogue what he has brought with him. This way, at least, if ever there is an incident, he will have a detailed, written and signed account of what has been found in his possessions to show to the Council in his defence.

The Guardians haven’t pulled him in for another mission yet and he is rather certain that they are aware of where he is going – even if, maybe, they aren’t entirely delighted to know it. There is some discrepancy in the perceived importance and right to existence of the emotional spectrums and their respective Corps, but as it is they are clever enough not to condemn a growing support of their own Corps to death, so he thinks that maybe ‘diplomatic travels’ could make up a valid excuse for his frequent visits there.

Not that it’s anywhere in the ballpark of being the truth – because he can be honest with, at least, himself – but it’s good enough to pass if the Smurfs are in a placated mood.

_He doesn’t dare hoping that they might be **happy** because Heaven Forbid they ever truly experience an emotion to the fullest. But placated, he can hope for. _

Earth was a nice change of routine for him; loud colours, loud people, and the _sun_. Jesus the sun on his face; true, gaseous sun, beautiful mixture of hydrogen and helium mellowed by just the perfect distance of _space_ between her and this pretty, pretty blue planet that had tots running around at hip-height screaming high-pitched war-cries at each other while they tried to hit each other with water-streams and steal your wallet in one go.

Simply beautiful.

But one dip into a small, nondescript side-alley store and he had basically all he needed, so back to space it was; towards Odym. It could be his imagination, but Space looked brighter of a sudden; friendlier.

 

-

 

The planet greets him with humble fanfare, the colourful tail-feathers of a bird winking at him right before its descent submerges it into the crown of one of the millennia-old trees, the Earth-like sun kissing his face just a lovely as the one he’s left behind barely a few hours ago and the mindful air that seems to permeate the planet wrapping around him like the hug of family.

Earthen Humans would need a lot longer to find Odym and he feels a little guilty for revelling in that knowledge. But as he sails with the gull-like birds that inhabit this planet and towards the highest mountain ridge his eyes can find, he thinks that maybe a visit here might just have to be earned. If ever they developed the tenacity to give up life on Earth for a true Space excursion like many other planet-inhabitants had, they might realize that beyond their own ground were others, unbelievably beautiful and humbling.

Like Odym.  
He has not met a sane person who has been here and not felt humbled by it.

Finding the mountain range, he swerves left past the peak of the high-point, steering lower and towards the first green plateau he can find; he descends further and _there_ – there is the First Tree. Hal slows his descent, touches down on the soft green to complete it on foot. The Blue Lanterns are more favourable of doing things the slow way, _meditative_ as they put it.

It’s not Hal’s style, but he’s a guest here and he can damn well adhere to the house rules.

Oa has felt good after months and months of travelling, having his _bed_ felt good, but being here means the literal world to him. His jacket warms his shoulders when there is still fog hanging around his head, but it clears and it gets drier and really, when he reaches Warth, he doesn’t exactly need it anymore.

“Brother Warth.”—he greets respectfully, bobs his head instead of offering a hand because _how do you shake hands with a pachyderm_ and the Blue Lantern offers the same courtesy ere motioning towards him.

“Hal Jordan,”—the entity pauses briefly, “-it is good to see you again.”—and there’s the smile; the one that comes out in the voice, the one that is not really material, instead of a _tone_. He knows when he’s being teased; he just doesn’t mind in this case.

“It is good to be here.”—he admits freely and he knows that in this zone he doesn’t even need to censor it, doesn’t need to hide it in the face of the Smurfs. He doesn’t know if _Judgment-free Zones_ are still a thing on Earth, but this is pretty much the literal embodiment.

The Lantern nods again and Hal reads it as the _go-on_ that it is, turning quietly and continuing on the path that he knows will lead him towards his ultimate destination. Already he feels invigorated merely by being in the presence of The Blue Lantern.

He happens upon Saint Walker next, the very Blue Lantern who has first shown him Odym and when he is spotted he doesn’t even bother to check his smile. Out of the other Corps’ Walker was one he considered his best friend and so goes for an embrace rather than a distant greeting.

“Hal.”—the Blue Lantern says gently when they unwrap, leaving a long hand on his shoulder and freely showing him the grin spreading on his pale face. “You have kept him waiting longer than usual.”—the Astonian admonishes gently; fatherly almost. He can see why Ganthet and Sayd had chosen him to be the first Blue Lantern.

Hal nods a little chagrined. “I’m hoping to make up for it.”—he admits and doesn’t miss the way that his friend’s face lights up at this.

“Then I am not going to keep you any longer.”—he nods benevolently. “I would look forward to having you for some _Gyrk_ at some point.”—he says as a way of parting and Hal smiles, nods, knows an invitation when he hears it and keeps it in mind for later as he completes his descent from the mountain, relishing in the lush grass under his feet and the woodland critters that are curious enough to come and inspect him.

 _This is what coming home feels like_.

 

-

 

Hal doesn’t, thankfully, need to guess a lot about where his ring will need to guide him because he has three good ideas of where to look before assistance would be required. His feet lead him into the woods, animals dispersing behind and around him, replaced by others but he is never quite alone when he follows the small footpath towards the forking.

He takes the right, deeper into the forest – he gets the feeling this is the right path to take today; his gut is telling him today is a clearing-kind-of-day instead of a waterfall-kind-of-day.

Several minutes into his walk, he is not disappointed.

The population of woodland-animals increases, owl-facsimiles lurking on branches, brightly coloured birds sticking out of their almost-sombre ranks, rabbit-creatures, jackalopes and larger deer-like hoofers lining the pathway. Hal can feel the light that they seem so peacefully attracted to and it would be enough, on another day, to join their audience and wait.

But Walker has hit a silent nerve when remarking upon the time it has taken since he’s last been here – it has taken a toll on him as well; and waiting is not really an option today.

He finds the clearing, the quiet breaking of trees, revealing the gently rolling meadow, illuminated by the warm sun, dotted with flowers too outlandish to name – he’s never been the best at botany but the large variety of species here challenges him more so than usual.

“You’re late.”—is the first thing he hears and, hey, it’s not exactly wrong; even so he steps fully into clearing, doesn’t set his duffel down and makes straight for the black-blue uniform not too far away from where he currently is himself.

For a moment he considers throwing himself around the shoulders of the man, sinking his face into the soft fabric of the uniform and simply breathing but negates that sentiment almost immediately; this particular Lantern has a habit of getting friendly with the fauna around him and is likely to have a critter on his lap. Hal doesn’t want to risk the ire in case he should upset a dozing animal.

He reaches the man – yup, animal on his lap getting the petting of its lifetime – and, dropping to his knees, carefully slings an arm around the broad shoulders that he has admittedly missed beyond imagination these last months and presses his nose into a clothed neck.

“Hello, Barry.”—he murmurs quietly.

_This is home._

 

-

 

Barry is always surprisingly gentle with him – in any and all ways; it had taken Hal some getting used to, at first, having a person, an actual Earth Human, around that was as mellow as the rest of the Blue Lanterns around him. Maybe it should have clicked earlier on that account, but Hal had never deluded himself into thinking that matters of emotion got through his thick skull quickly; he’s a little too aware that it’s usually quite the contrary.

Having another Human in another Lantern Corps was a little challenging at first, mostly because the Blue Lanterns couldn’t quite figure out how to deal with him – despite the fact that he was an undoubtedly splendid scholar and had already learned lessons in his life that propelled him deeper into the understanding of the Blue Lantern than many others in his position. But as an Earthen Human, he needed sleep, he needed regular nourishment and basically required care that other Blue Lanterns had, until this point, not – or, at least, not in such quantities.

Hal had been asked to come and mediate – of all things – in order to make the new Blue Lantern as comfortable as possible; what he had thought would be a traumatizing event for all those involved, and it could have been, he stands by this, the New Blue managed most of the mediating – relying on Hal mostly for explanations on an alien world he couldn’t yet fully grasp. Barry Allen hadn’t needed a mediator so much as a translator and, for some reason, even after the initial mission had ended, Hal couldn’t stop visiting.

He knew before, of course, that any relationship between a Green and a Blue Lantern would be symbiotic – it wasn’t his first time interacting with the Blues after all, but the level on which he connected with the Human Lantern astounded even him.

There was companionship, naturally, a wish to ease the man into staying on a new planet in a way that he himself hadn’t been – but this… extended beyond that even, as he later realized.

Because Barry was likeable; damnably easily so.  
And Hal hadn’t ever been really good at denying himself.

He was, however, a Green Lantern and as such honest to himself and to his Corps – because they deserved that, and they needed to be able to trust him. Thus, he needed to be able to trust himself first – and that meant coming clean about his designs behind his visits sooner rather than later.

Which is why he let Barry know of his intentions to come by a lot more often than he previously had – _“as often as I can, if that is alright with you”_ – and Barry… Barry had been easy, acquiesced with that secret smile of his and let him know that there were bound to be at least three places he was most likely to be at; and that was that.

Hal knew to accept the (more) pleasant moments, the soothing tone of Barry’s timbre that gentled him down from nightmares, the careful fingers that wove through his hair, the quiet buzz that always seemed to intensify around Barry – but he was always waiting for a _moment_ ; for a crash; for a sudden, abrupt, violent deviation from something that was quickly becoming his favourite routine.

And it held him back for months before he realized that it was a fear to lose what he was building with Barry that was, sooner or later, going to impeach this gift in reality. So he worked on it in quiet privacy, enjoying the days with the man rather than hoarding them in fear of them being numbered.

“You know that is not how I work, yes?”—Barry asked him a few weeks later, literally helping him regain his footing after he’d broken his leg in three different places on a mission.

Hal hadn’t actually breached the topic, but something must have given it away… that or Barry had known all along and had simply waited for a good moment to address it – which was way more likely. He’d only grunted, focussed on making another step, but hadn’t found a good way to answer; Barry – bless him – had taken it as incentive to continue talking.

“Aside from the fact that I’m relatively certain it’s not how the Blue Lantern Corps is supposed to work – and I think it’s an actual like… requirement for recruits or something – it’s really not my goal to lead you on in any way.”

“I know.”—and Hal _did_ know that it wasn’t Barry’s idea of being friends with somebody only to stab them in the back in any way.

“Good.”—Barry had conceded and they hadn’t talked about it since then. Haven’t really needed to either; mostly because Hal is grateful for every day that he does get to spend with Barry and the man himself is a singular wonder who will always give what he can.

So Hal returns, time and time again, learns about Barry, sleeps next to him on the self-made straw-mattress, burrowing into the lean figure of the Lantern, eats with him in the mornings, noons and evenings and stays with him when the man meditates, slipping into rest or reading through one of the great-many tomes the Oan Library would let him take to another planet (they were wicked about what was and what wasn’t allowed) and talks Space to him.

 

-

 

Barry’s small hut is a small piece of heaven that Hal has always been a little proud of having helped to design and construct. The inherent outlay is way less sophisticated than any basic building on Oa, but Barry has not made one modification to it and it looks lived-in, homey, in a way that lets Hal know – every time he steps foot in it – just how much his friend appreciates it.

He is careful when he puts his duffel bag down on the elevated platform where Barry’s mattress has been pushed into the corner by the window, doesn’t want to disturb the assortment of presents he has stashed inside – and is promptly met with a small, wet, curious nose.

“ _Wallace_.”—he greets the jackalope softly, pulling the long ears through calloused fingers. “You eat all your greens?”

Barry snorts a little, as he often does when observing Hal with the jackalope he’d found early on during his stay at Odym – Wallace was Barry’s first patient and, since then, most loyal companion. He has no idea why his friend would go around christening a jackalope Wallace, of all names, but such is the way of Barry Allen and the creature is absolutely endearing, so why the flark not.

Hal takes a seat next to where Barry has knelt at what he jokingly likes to call his hearth-fire, stoking at the ember remnants of this morning’s fire. There’s some left over water in the bucket that he knows fills every evening at the stream right as the sun is about to go down to have in the mornings.

“Tea?”

For a moment he wonders if he should unveil the wonders of his duffel just yet, but then decides against it because… it could make a nice morning all in all. So he nods and watches.

 

-

 

Barry is warm against him, sleep-heavy and pliant in his arms when he pulls him closer sometime deeper into the night – there isn’t even a murmur of protest when he does so and Hal breathes a little easier with the slighter man tight against his chest.

The blond is beautiful in the moonlight that illuminates him through the open window towards their heads, pale hue drawing shadows in the planes of the man’s physique almost timidly, as if touching the man in his arms were a ceremonial. Hal can understand its hesitance – even as his large hand spans across the lower back of his friend, draws soothing circles on the bared skin. Barry’s exhale warms his sternum and he circles his other hand around the head of the blond, cradling him there before his chin sags and his eyes droop.

Nowhere does he sleep better than next to Barry.

 

-

 

As is routine for them, Barry inadvertently wakes Hal when he makes ready for his morning run – something that, apparently, even Space couldn’t take away from him. Hal has no problem with this, joins, sometimes, too – although Barry must have been a Track-Runner or something because hell those legs could go fast – but today he would really rather try and see if coffee in space tasted any different than it did on Earth.

_It does, but that might be the absolute delight on Barry’s features when he discovers just what Hal is holding in his hand._

 

-

 

He’s always a little… wistful when Hal leaves, but always feels silly for it a few moments later, when he eventually catches himself staring at that singular, ever-changing, point on the horizon that his friend’s silhouette vanished from his eye-sight.

The first few times it happened – about a year into their acquaintance – Barry had chided himself mentally, berating himself for acting like a woman from the fifties, staring into the sinking sun from their front-porch, hanker-chief clutched to their chest as the broad back of their man melds with the orange glare of the orb as he heroically walks off to heed yet another call of Uncle Sam.

_He’s been kind of a sucker for War-time stories on Earth, sue him._

Since then he has learned to be honest with himself, to accept that this was-is-will-probably-always-be a feeling that is steadfastly tied to the visual input of his friend leaving – because, now, he knows that making himself suffer by listening to these degrading thoughts he’d directed at himself, he destroys what burns brightest in him even during those moments:

The Hope that Hal Jordan will live to return another time.

So when the Green Lantern suits up five days into his stay and presses a gentle, unassuming kiss to his forehead, he knows that Hal himself hopes to return yet one more time – _Wally_ is, after all, still nibbling holes into his favourite Air-Force-Shirt. Hal hasn’t even spared a grimace when he’d discovered it.

He knows that Hal is one of the best that the Green Corps has seen in a while; that his unusual approach on diplomacy yields more surprisingly pleasing results than enraged reactions. It’s a miracle that he’s certain is a mystery even to The Guardians of the Green Lantern and it’s irreplicable too, which makes the older man a much demanded agent.

Barry allows himself to be a little proud of his friend; even though it has nothing to do with him personally – but he has grown to like it when the people of space underestimated the Earthen Human only to find out that it was a grave mistake.

Brother Walker finds him, much later, rubbing his fingers over the long, relaxed floppy ears of a jackalope and doesn’t much talk when he joins him in quiet contemplation. He’s always liked the natural companionship that permeates his Corps like the air that they share – it strengthens his understanding of them as family.

 

-

 

The call to action comes unexpected, but none of his Brothers or Sisters hesitate to collect around the foot of the mountain and The Lantern and even though Barry himself finds his way there too, he doesn’t actually think that they will ask him to come with them.

As a mere acolyte to the ways of The Blue Lantern, he is usually a rational choice to stay behind and protect Odym – he doesn’t always like it, but it gives him the chance to prove himself as the backbone of his family; hoping fervently and strongly for their well-being and continued belief in their hope. They haven’t yet returned defeated and maybe his Hope is strong enough to actually carry over to his brethren; he likes the idea.

“Barry Allen, what has you stalling?”

He almost drops Wally from his arms when Sayd directly addresses him, but swallows around the panicked nervous-jump of his larynx before he answers: “I was not aware I would be going…?”

It sounds a little weak in retrospect, but it is rather the truth, so he doesn’t try to alter his response by adding explanations that might warp it; Wally snuggles soothingly into the crook of his left elbow, whiskers tickling the finger-tips of his right hand where it cradles the docile animal.

The Guardian gives him a quiet smile. “We have had almost strict orders to make certain that you, specifically, would be coming along with the envoy.”

 _Hal_ —is his first, desperate thought that makes his heart batter against his ribcage in a shrill, fearful scream, even as he is gentle in letting his friend down to the ground, stepping closer to the Lantern and something like resolve hardens in him with almost gleeful power as he recites the Oath.

_I’m going to make you hopeful like you won’t believe._

 

-

 

It _is_ Hal that they find; stubbornly circling around a small herd of _Guodanan Horses_ – nearly extinct at one point and since put under the protection of the Intergalactic Council, lest the universe lose them for the invaluable ingredients that one can garner from pretty much every part of them as well as their mystic speed that, if scrolls can be believed, surpasses even that of light.

Three more Green Lanterns are carefully arranged around the cluster of animals, rings flashing intermittently and with increasing time gaps threatening to go out any minute while Hal, the absolute wonderful idiot, is stubbornly defending the ambushed travellers with a might that belies its futility and eventual ending.

Barry dives before Walker can even give him the okay, but his family doesn’t try to tell him to hold back – they know what he is here for; they know what they are here for.

_What do you hope for?_

The complete mental well-being and physical health of Hal Jordan.  
The success of the Green Lantern Corps.  
The survival and continued existence of the Guadonan Horses.

He inserts himself seamlessly into the fray, coming to hover just behind Hal and between him and the rest of the Green Lantern Corps where he can feel the power of Hope ease the strain on the protective detail of the herd. Barry focusses on Hal’s stand against a ragtag group of mercenaries and pirates that, by some chance, happened onto a spacecraft that – really – he cannot identify the make of, but its strongpoints are suited perfectly for the combat of a Lantern.

Barry decides that it would have needed to be specifically made for such a battle – the way it reacts to commands, shifts shields, attacks at _odd_ but rapid intervals is unbelievable.

_What do you hope for?_

That Hal Jordan finds a weak-spot in his adversary to successfully exploit.  
That innocent lives be spared.  
That the focus of the Green Lanterns present be impeccable.

He doesn’t notice that he has floated into a meditative seat, but is briefly jolted out of it when the re-energized Cadre of Green Lanterns swings past him and towards Hal’s irrefutably strong-willed attempts to make a literal dent in the armour-craft opposing him.

_What do you hope for?_

The survival and continued existence of the Guodanan Horses.  
The mental well-being and physical health of the Green Lantern Corps.  
Balance.

Away from Odym in a way he hasn’t truly been before, he can feel the pulse of the Ring around his finger more prominent than usually, can count out the rhythm of his power flowing from him, feeding the air around him with bright Hope and even as his head goes a little lighter and his skin a little warmer, he suddenly feels as if he could do this all day.

 

-

 

Barry snuggles closer into the heavy embrace of his friend – Hal a more convincing furnace than the small fire the pair of guarding Lanterns were keeping alive through the night.

Hal, despite Barry’s presence, had sustained heavy injuries before his arrival and while Hope could mend nearly all of them, physical remainders needed more time and a deeper connection; which is why Barry glued himself stubbornly to his friend’s side and hadn’t left when it had been decreed by the small squadron that Hal, having done most of the heavy lifting apparently, would do better to sleep through the night.

He’s rather awake himself; the power of his ring still humming through his veins even when its entity is quiet, perhaps just as deep asleep as his friend is at the moment – he has heard, but steadfastly ignored, the wondering, and maybe a little snide, comments of his friend’s Corps about Barry slipping under the blankets with him and a part of him wonders if Hal will have to defend his actions before The Guardians when he returns to Oa. But right now it’s Barry’s duty to make certain that Hal will even manage to get there on his own.

For now that means sleeping off the residue shock his body has suffered from the injuries and Barry is all too aware that, usually, the vigilant man would never allow himself to submerge this fully into slumber – no matter how much needed it is; but his own presence entices a conditioned response in the nervous system of the Green Lantern that eases him into sleep without even the slightest hitch.

 

-

 

Barry takes his leave from Hal’s side earlier than he would like especially considering that neither of them really know when they will see again, but Barry lets Hal know that Wally has taken up permanent residence in his shirt and that there will, even the next time, be enough coffee for at least two cups – he’s already sequestered it away – and Hal gives him a smile that makes up for what both of them know will be too long a period of separation, no matter how brief it will really be.

He feels no less wistful when they part, but this time, at least, he has the last leg of the journey to focus on when, before, all he could choose from was returning to the Hut that would suddenly feel emptier without Hal’s form taking up additional space, or retreating to some part of the forest where the critters were furry and his mind would ease under the purring puffs and clicking chatter of the fauna surrounding him like a heap of tribbles and just as relaxing.

His family is a pillow of support surrounding him, quiet but understanding and Barry allows himself to drop into it, allows the metaphorical shields around his mind and his emotions to drop, opening himself up to the warmth-care-love of his people around him.

_Never having known it before, he’d never missed it – but he would now._

They arrive on Odym as one and go to find the Guardians first; Sister Sercy, having stayed behind to recuperate from a rather daunting hit on her morale is the one to greet them – better in constitution, the Hope that shines from her is brighter than the beacon of a lighthouse, bringing them home. He answers her smile with one of his own.

“It does my soul good to see you all hale and healthy, Brothers.”—she sings softly; and Walker, floating before him, puts a calming palm to her shoulder.

“It is good to have returned.”—he replies solemn but honestly relieved; Barry can _feel_ the ease of his Brothers around, so obvious now that they are ensconced in the familiarity of their planet’s atmosphere once more; he can’t help but feel the same.

“They are waiting for you.”

 

-

 

 _This_ is _not_ how he thought he was going to see Barry again.

“Give it up, you blathering _pimple_!”—he yells at the man that has once been his friend; Sinestro’s face morphs into the superior sneer that has been stuck to his face seemingly forever.

“I see your vernacular has not improved since last we’ve had the _pleasure_ of meeting.”—he jabs. “This is surprising, given that my alternate run-ins with various members of both your Corps as well as your race have allowed me insight on their ability to form proper sentences. I believe the setback on your incapability of conversation is… all you.”

It’s hard to not give in to the raw aggravation that Sinestro knows so well to manipulate and incite in him, but Hal has been down that road and he is well aware of the short distance that goes from aggravation to anger to hate; he’s not going to do that.

Not even when the bastard holds The Guardians hostage.

“Hal.”

First instinct is to yell at Barry, to tell him off for _being_ here because he is so very, very well aware of how vulnerable the man is in the – likely – case that Hal loses it. _He’s too close to the precipice._ But even as he turns to glare at the blond, who’s ring flares bright and blue as he meets equally blue eyes, harsh and glaring, _defying_ the anger in Hal.

“Look at that.”—Sinestro sings; closer now than before, but his tone doesn’t scratch at his nerves the way it has done before and Hal turns, gives the yellow, glinting orbs a derisive, stubborn look of his own as he positions himself in Barry’s favour.

“I have heard stories of you, Barry Allen of Earth.”—the red man continues, comes as close as he dares with Hal between them; Sinestro might not like to admit it, but Hal secretly believes that he knows just how dangerous Earthen Humans can be when threatened.

_Not that far removed from their animal ancestry, are they, when pushed into a corner?_

Barry, wisely, doesn’t answer, but Hal feels the gentle touch of a hand in the middle of his back, before the fervent power of Hope suffuses him in a heady rush – it’s a sensation that he hasn’t known before; even working with the Blue Lanterns it has never felt like _this_.

It’s not that he feels invincible or even one hundred percent certain of his victory; but he senses the anger in his gut receding from a boil to a low simmer to absolute cool and his mind clears so wonderfully quick that he realizes what Sinestro has been doing – playing into a weakness of his that he really should have noticed earlier. He focusses back on the red-skinned beanpole.

“You don’t talk to him.”—he says shortly, pouring anger into the syllables that he doesn’t feel but might just actually fool his opponent as he pulls up his right hand to aim just slightly over Sinestro’s shoulder – if it hits him by accident… well.

“Hal-“—the man tuts, shakes his head; “-you’ve already _tried_ shooting at me for the last hour; you didn’t get a hit in. What makes you think you will now? Or do you… _hope_?”

He hopes that Sinestro will just learn to keep his yap shut for a few moments once; but as he sneers and rushes the man – the beautiful sensation of Barry in his back, _touching him_ , jerks him for one fraction of a second, before the feeling returns, intensifies, burns through his body with bright clearness that breaks through on his face and splits his lips into a large grin.

Now.

He shoots once.

Hits.

The locks on the cages around The Guardians drop; Kilowog moves in and his recruits follow with almost blind obedience, like a swarm of angry, green hornets – Sinestro doesn’t know what happened. By the time he might have deduced it, it will be far too late.

 

-

 

“That was dangerous.”—cautious silence: thoughtful and potentially dangerous in their experience; especially concerning these two. He sighs: “Spit it out.”

It’s a phrase he’s learned from the Earthen Humans, they have quite a way with words when impatience is at hand.

“Besides the factual matter that it worked,”—Ganthet starts, carefully, voiding an argument that could have further made his point, intriguing, “-we have, ourselves, been unaware of the magnitude of our Corps’ ability. While aware that this manoeuvre was a technical possibility, we have yet to come to terms with the reality of it having happened. As such, whatever your misgivings about the events of the latest mission, we would be greatly in your debt if you were amenable to postponing this council for at least half a day.”

He sighs with some exasperation, despite the fact that he can follow the sentiment. Recruits from heretofore undrafted planets have, in their own experience, tendencies to achieve what might before have been considered impossible.

_They had never thought that any lifeform could possibly survive as the vessel to their Element for a longer duration of time – Hal Jordan had proved them wrong. They had never thought that there would, in their lifetime, truly be a White Lantern – Kyle Rayner had proved them wrong._

He nods curtly. “Half a day, Ganthet; we can afford no more.”  
They can, but this might just become a matter of urgency.

As it turns out, it doesn’t. Because Barry Allen is beyond cooperative, even if the man fought valiantly to suppress the shaking in his knees when faced with their _Reader_ – he could be wrong of course, but maybe there was just a small shine of hazy green in his otherwise blue eyes when he straightened his back and met their entity head on, mind wide open and offering no resistance at all. He doesn’t think he’s ever seen a _reading_ pass by so quickly.

But he watches from the side-lines even then; quiet as he has always had a reputation for being, observing when the young man, stumbling from exhaustion and drained from being confronted up close with the entirety of his wrong-doings, misgivings, errors and failures in his assumingly short life is ensconced in the arms of none other than their own Green Lantern whose eyes _roar_ at them through his forced quiet, just as he pulls the other closer, high into his arms and stalks out of the Round Room.

He follows, swiftly, hidden, silent like a shadow, calculates the trajectory of their valued member and arrives well before him in the community quarters set aside for the small squadron of Blue Lanterns – but Hal Jordan does not enter.

In fact, and he realizes this only later, the Green Lantern has not even made towards the separate rooms prepared for their guests and, as he rationalizes instead, must have gone for his own barracks. He cannot follow there… but he can still observe. And thus he does; watches from behind one of the screens as Hal Jordan himself activates the surveillance installed in his roomings – safety precautions that they have yet to regret – and leaves the door open when he makes for the hygienic amenities.

Barry Allen is cared for: washed, put in Earthen clothing and then rolled into _The Fleece_ before being cautiously fed, watered and then put to rest; Hal Jordan keeping a vigilant eye for both his door and the resting figure of his friend.

They’ve known about Hal Jordan’s many – superfluous – visits to Odym ever since the Earthen Human going by the name of Barry Allen has been instated there as a Blue Lantern and have hypothesized that this might surpass the mere notion of supporting a fellow Human in his phase of transition. This, however, is a depth in relationship they have not considered.

Hal Jordan is not obsessively greedy about the other man’s presence and attention, or even angry at him, his Corps, or the Guardians – but he is being extremely cautious and aware of the man’s well-being and his recuperation.

Barry Allen’s manoeuvre could possibly have backfired on both of the Corps; it could have rendered the Human inert and obsolete, but something about the way that the blond curls around Hal Jordan’s sitting form, even in deep rest, lets him know that… the research on the symbiosis of the Green and the Blue Lantern Corps might just have been neglected severely by their own refusal to accept the latter.

When Barry Allen rises a lot sooner than he realistically should have after having his brain plowed through without any thought to finesse or care, his decision is cemented.

 

-

 

“Take it easy there, love.”—he advises the man, stops his rapid-fire intake of cantina-grub for all of five seconds before Barry digs back in. Hal groans helplessly: “You’ll puke it out in about half an hour again. _Please_ , Barry, slow down.”

It’s probably the _please_ that does it.  
Either way Barry forcibly halts his hand-to-mouth motions that have been going at almost unnatural speed.

Hal watches him swallow almost painfully before he takes a deep breath. His fingers are shaking now that they are still long enough for him to see; he doesn’t hesitate to reach out with his own, grasp the slender digits of his friend, squeezing them in reassurance. He doesn’t need to talk, or to listen with his ears, to have a feeling about what Barry’s current situation is like.

_He’s been through the Reader himself at… several points; not a fun experience: Zero of Ten would recommend._

But watching the blond go through it is something that he never, for as long as he lives, wants to have to witness again – they would have to lock him up in the Looney Bin, he’s been so sick with worry.

His hands are larger than Barry’s, stupidly warmer too and he hasn’t noticed, before, that the man might have been shaking both from the experience, as well as the cold that comes after a round with the _Reader_ , like an ill-attempted greeting card by a psycho. He holds a little tighter.

“You want to go back up?”—he asks quietly, maps out the place, knows that if Barry is anything like him, the panic-or-paranoia might just be setting in any moment. But his friend shakes his head.

“Can… Can I sit next to you?”—he asks instead and, yes, fuck, yes of course. Hal almost jumps out of his seat to usher Barry into the very corner of the room, placing himself between him and the world while the blond watches in silence. He doesn’t even mind when he burrows into Hal’s side.

 

-

 

It’s three days before Barry Allen returns to them and his heart and mind opens up to their inquisition as to his recent whereabouts – Walker is neither surprised to find Hal Jordan practically glued to the side of their Brother, nor to find their Brother’s Hope beautifully repaired in his heart.

The very heart that he has watched Hal Jordan wrap his gentle, stubborn, hands around with protective intentions and an open heart that fervently willed the well-being of another being without becoming an impeachment to them.

Saint Walker has watched intently; he has spoken a lot to both men, mapped out their mental landscapes and their hearts – and even as someone who has, until their passing moment, been devoted to his family without looking back, he does not think he has ever encountered a love of the heart which lights such Hope that a Blue Lantern would recuperate from a blow as heavy as that of a _Reader_ without his own Lantern at hand.

Barry Allen might be a Refuge for the Green Lantern known as Hal Jordan.

Saint Walker has come to realize that Hal Jordan, however, might just be Hope personified to the Blue Lantern known as Barry Allen.

And when the Green Lantern is given leave to aid the newest member of the Blue Corps in his recuperation, Saint Walker makes it a very obvious point to put the man as close to Brother Barry as possible at all times. The Guardians of Oa may not, yet, feel comfortable with the admission of closeness between these two Humans – Saint Walker has no compunction about the union, or about voicing his support of it.

One can always Hope after all.


	2. ...the one where Barry gets de-aged Pt. 1 (M)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> ... in which Barry gets zapped and ends up his 17-year-old self with no memories of Hal, but since they're maried Hal is the one to take care of him // and Hal is hit on a lot (because Barry)

+++

 

He doesn’t really have a choice in this, now does he? Not, admittedly, that he wouldn’t choose to follow the current plant of action; he’s been happily married to the man for years now and there’s a reason for it. This is just… not how he thought his Front Leave would go. Besides the fact that he would need more than just the two weeks granted to him; probably.

“Hey there.”—he greets the young man softly, careful, as he nears him, to make certain that his hands are visible to the other. “I’m here to help, okay?”

The blond nods, a bit too nervous for his tastes, but there’s – at least – the willingness to hear him out if nothing else. He’ll take what he can get; sits himself down on the chair next to the bed that the other is rested on, making sure that his hands are still visible.

“Do you know who you are?”—he starts, gently he needs to remind himself, _gently_ , they do not know how else the spell impaired him.

“Bar-“—he coughs, voice scratchy, unused. He hands him the prepared glass of water, takes a sip himself before he puts a straw in and very cautiously waits to see if he can hold it himself. He can, if shakily; takes a sip. “Barry.”—he answers.

Hal notices that he is not offering a last name and it’s a smart move: not giving up any more information than strictly necessary until he knows who he is dealing with, where he is at. Or it would be, if Hal could be certain that Barry even _knew_ his current last name.

“Hello Barry.”—he repeats his greeting. “My name is Hal.”

If the paranoia is real in the young man then he probably won’t _believe_ him, but he’s not going to be caught lying at a later date. “Do you know where you are?”

Barry shakes his head negative, eyes hectic, nervous and afraid and Hal… can’t remember the last time he’s seen him like this, but he’s going to make certain that it will go away as soon as possible.

“You’re at Justice League Headquarters.”—he tells the man. “In the Med-Bay.”

It’s an obvious statement, yes, he’s relatively certain that Barry has realized he’s in some kind of medical environment – it’s not hard to guess with the stench of sterile alcohol and meds wafting pungently around them.

“What’s a Justice League?”

And boy… they weren’t certain about the magnitude of impairment but it’s pretty obvious that there is a freaking large chunk missing.

 

-

 

Hal takes him to their home; the one that, honestly, he isn’t in enough to actually call it that if it weren’t for Barry and his beautiful, blessed, hide that makes it so – with his countless books stapled both in shelves as well as on top of each other, with his science magazines and riddles, with his old family photos and Garrick-Recipes, with his thick carpets and warm blankets.

Of course Barry, as he is now, can’t remember that – or not much of it; just enough to recognize that he’s been living here, with a little Hal on the side. He’s going to cross that bridge when they get to it, for now he watches the blond sag into the beat up leather chair that has been his father’s at some point.

Seeing Barry like this – _slow_ – is surprising, new and not a little unsettling; The Bat has, along with some of the cleverer minds of the JLA, deduced that Barry has been physically de-aged, that much was obvious with one look, but the memory-loss that goes with reverting him back to this stage… is a might bit disconcerting. Although Barry has been mostly alright with the fact that his timeline is wrong, that he is, actually, already employed, and that things were not as he remembers them.

If anything, it’s the compliance that freaks him.  
But he is going to be very careful about this – Lord knows he’s usually really bad at stuff like that and Barry has had to make up for too many of his misgivings; he’s going to be very fucking good at this, just for Barry.

“Shower?”

Barry barely nods, already halfway to sleep, wrestling himself up from his slouched position and onto his feet. “Where to?”

 

-

 

This is going to be so hard.

Usually coming back from Space means at least two days of gratuitous sex, all the fast-food they can find and more sex – it’s always a joyous occasion; unless, obviously, a JLA mission comes in… or his husband gets de-aged by some idiot witch back into a phase and body that is not legal for Hal to want. Which sucks.

But he’s also not going to abandon his wedded man at a moment like this – even though the blond, obviously, has no idea who he is. Which sucks doubly.

So what he _is_ doing is upholding vows that his better half cannot remember, and being a friend to the young man – barely seventeen – who is aspiring to be a forensic scientist later on in his life and who doesn’t even know how he ended up several years in the future. Hal can cook decently, he can watch over the other and he can damn well sit down with him on Sunday mornings to watch the Cartoons with a bowl on his lap, the cereal box and milk to his left, stationed to be ready for replenishing at any moment.

 _For better or worse_ sure gets tested when part of the Justice League.

The thing is, Barry is a clever little muffin and his never-ending stream of questions – no matter how covert he is about actually asking them, weaving them skilfully into conversation or making them sound so absurd and off-topic that any thought of the ruse is quickly discarded due to its obviousness – and he is hell-bent on driving Hal crazy by proving to him that even without a speedster brain there is a reason he’s been CCPD’s most valuable forensic asset despite having been recruited straight out of college.

At first he doesn’t even realize it. Because all in all the questions are innocuous enough, as well as horribly justified – if this is his flat how come Hal knows where everything is; how come he has a key; are they close considering the Portier just greeted them on first name basis; how close are they; where are the matches; where is the ring on his finger that has left a white strip on his otherwise tanned skin; does he have a copy of this or that book; who is he married to; why isn’t he with his husband; what is the Justice League.

Barry Allen, Hal finds, is a smart piece of shit and he’s going to find out what the League’s Leading Triad has declared hush-hush a lot sooner than either of them would like.

_But then, this is his husband – and he honestly cannot wait to see Batsy’s face when he realizes that a seventeen-year-old has cracked the mystery wide open without any help. Because that would be just like the man he has fallen in love with._

 

-

 

“When were you going to tell me that we are married?”—the blond asks over breakfast-cereals and Hal has been still lingering in the last residues of sleep when the question comes which is why he is caught off guard and the resulting jolt going through his body makes him burn his tongue on the coffee he was just taking a sip of.

Time to cross that bridge, apparently.  
At… eight-thirty on a Tuesday morning.

Hal clears his throat, swallows around the violent tingle on his tongue that indicates the offended spots in his mouth.

“You look, feel and think like seventeen, Barry. No way in hell was I going to spring on you the fact that you’re bound to a man who’s barely in your age category under usual circumstances.”

“Assuming you are talking about my twenty-seven year-old-self that would probably put you into your late thirties or early forties.”—the man deduces and his eyes rake over him in a way that is almost nostalgic for Hal, having had this look directed at him at several points during their frayed history of dating. “You look… well-preserved.”

Space will do that to you as Barry has found out a few years ago. He’s not aware of it now, obviously, but something about the near-to-steady fluctuation about the inertia found on other planets coupled with the symbiotic lifestyle with an alien _element_ could not only, technically, prolong his life but did, indeed, take very good care of his body. This theory, of course, is yet discounting the effects that a Blue Lantern can have on the physical and mental constitution of a Green Lantern as well as the exercise and space travel that comes with taking the Universal Soldier Part very much literally.

Hal can’t tell Barry this, not yet. “Thank you.”—he says instead, still not entirely certain how to navigate this situation; stalling seems like a good tactic for now – if only to figure out how much Barry thinks he knows.

“The decision not to inform me of this was not only yours though, was it?”

More of a _proposal_ from the Bat – Hal shakes his head negative and leans back, watching the gears turn in Barry’s mind. He’s always been oddly beautiful in his moments of genius; a few years off his face don’t change that and Hal is starved for his love even under ‘normal’ circumstances. Watching the brilliance shining through the eyes of the man that he put a ring on is one of his favourite things – even if those orbs are now encased by less wrinkles than he is admittedly used to (or comfortable with, come to think of it).

“Okay.”—Barry draws the last syllable out, moves his chin upwards in a wave-like-motion as his voice rises with it; it’s a habit Hal recognizes. “So: you’re my husband, which makes a lot more sense now – I am a part of a meta-human collaboration called the Justice League, probably because I usually _have_ meta abilities – I have somehow lost them – and because no one knows how to restore them, we’re beached.”

That about sums it up. Hal nods again; Barry hums.

“How come you don’t have a serious case of blue-balls?”

For about a second the table-top beckons his forehead – Hal almost gives in.

 

-

 

A very valid point in all of this – the whole situation and crackpot extraordinaire that Hal can barely even begin to understand – which has to be mentioned, is that Barry Allen is a beautiful man. Hal has known this for some time now and when he will, hopefully inevitably, watch Barry age, he is certain that his husband will be beautiful even then. Because that is just the magic of Barry Allen, Fastest Man Alive.

Hal might be well-preserved in the face of space and some odd circumstances, but Barry has the quick metabolism and healing rate of a speed-force in his corner and if they survive long enough, he is convinced that they will be a pair of fucking beautiful bastards even at sixty. Seriously, just take a look at Garrick; Barry has some very strong points going for him on his side of the table.

What he has _not_ counted on, is that Barry Allen, seventeen, is just as beautiful and alluring as he is a few years later – with the difference that, then, he probably already has a few sexual encounters under his belt other than Hal.

And the fact that Hal’s eyes disobey his mental command to _stop staring, oh my God_ , or that some very visceral – and usually congenially hidden – desire to take this version of his husband to bed and show him what he might not know yet, watch that slim waist disappear under his hands because he’s relatively certain it would, and leave bruises all over the skin that is yet unmarred by scars so deep that even an elevated healing factor could not erase them does not make his predicament any easier. He wonders how Barry loves when he is _slow_.

So, to be very honest, he suffers from a serious case of blue-balls as the younger man so eloquently put it – there’s a reason he’s been sleeping on the couch and standing up way earlier than he usually would after all. Barry doesn’t need to know that though.

He might be hiding it rather well, but Hal _knows_ him, inside and out, and he can read the stress and confusion in the gangly limbs of the man he loves, even when he prances around in nothing but a towel wrapped around his hips because the clothes are too fucking big on him and he needs to borrow something of Wally’s stash instead.

_It is his fervent hope that none of the Leaguers have actually contacted the young West on this new development – he does not want to imagine that train-wreck._

Therefore, even as he finds himself on the receiving end of the intense stare of one Barry Allen, trying to figure him out in a facsimile of what he had been doing long before they entered this strange union of theirs, he smiles and doesn’t act on it. Barry has unlocked the _logic_ behind what is happening, this is not the same as actually having his memories back.

His dick is not convinced but that’s another story – one that is told in many showers and bitten palms and a knowing look and almost-smirk from the blond that he becomes very good at ignoring.

 

-

 

Because he can’t hope to sequester away seventeen odd years of energy and curiosity, Hal doesn’t even try to. The first week, sure, they stay in, get used to each other and acclimate to their current circumstances.

The start of the second week, however, Hal becomes all too aware that locking Barry in is not a good idea – and it has really never been, so why should this be any different, really? And since he is world’s most attentive husband, mostly to make up for his long absences and because Barry always makes wonderful faces when surprised, he pulls the younger under his arm and into the Technical Museum – in Vienna.

It’s one that Barry – as he knows him – hasn’t yet crossed off his list, never mind how quickly he really could be there, but Hal has only very little compunction about using his ring to zoom them across the ocean and into the old city when the weather forecast announces nothing but sun all day long. Considering that Central is inundated by measly weather and rain, the young blond doesn’t protest and watches in fascination.

“Welcome to Vienna.”—Hal smiles when they land in the underbrush of some smaller forest at the edge of the city. The ring could give him precise coordinates, but where is the fun in that when the alternative means mucking around a strange place with literally no plan but all the intuition to guide you. Although Hal has taken a map with him and some general directions, given that he actually _wants_ to end up in the Museum.

The green is lush around them, the houses along the paved street lustrous and beautiful. It’s nothing like the city herself – Hal knows, he’s scouted the venue before, if superficially and only to get a feeling for the layout that is so unlike the organized chess-board arrangement of America’s towns and cities – but it’s nice nevertheless.

“Vienna as in Austria?”—Barry asks wondering as he blinks across the road, trying to decipher the street-name; Hal has no idea how to pronounce it, but that’s alright.

“The very same.”

The blond turns and gives him a look that is somewhere between stupefied, incredulous and purely amazed – Hal soaks it up. “You know that their technical museum has a high-voltage laboratory that is accessible to the public?”—he’s getting excited now a familiar combination of a fast tongue, gleaming eyes and flailing limbs. He nods. “What are we waiting for?!”

 

-

 

The visit to (a) another continent, (b) another country and (c) a technical museum Barry Allen has not yet been to – even aged twenty-seven – is one of the best ideas Hal as ever had even when it backfires so fucking spectacularly that there is not a single hope of saving what has been before.

Because of course it doesn’t merely stop at the museum that they find themselves stuck in for about half a day while Barry zips and zaps from B to X and over to J barely able to hide his absolute fascination with the ingenious solutions that early on inventors have apparently possessed. Hal can’t say he’s indifferent, given the fact that many of the machines would still work today if treated well and handled correctly – it’s definitely a plus point for humanity should the Zombie Apocalypse come into being and their natural resources fall into the fingers of the larger powers who might, then, be unwilling to share. Barry laughs at him when he voices this, but it’s a good laugh so Hal takes it.

Since the museum is not nearly as large as American Exhibits tend to be, however, they are through rather soon – and even though Barry could, by the looks of it, forever stroll around the corners and hallways of the building, or hide in the niches of the high-voltage laboratory, Hal needs sustenance and, by some miracle, manages to convince Barry that he, too, should eat something.

And while they could easily take a small detour to the Schloss Schönbrunn – the Imperial Palace of Vienna, at a five minutes’ distance from the museum – Hal hasn’t done his recon for nothing and instead pulls his almost husband into one of the trams to go for another part of the city entirely. They can’t make heads or tails of the menu, but the waitress is well versed in English either way and it’s good from there.

As previously stated, it’s one of Hal’s better ideas and will go down in his book for future references. The part that sucks is Barry. Not literally, obviously, but about half-way through his animated chatter about the museum, sitting over an authentic Thai dish that, even in its mild version, is painting the face of his love bright with a sheen of sweat his face changes into something dangerously curious and Hal can’t help but get the feeling that his attentive listening and stupid smiling has just signed his own death warrant.

It doesn’t start, however, until two days later when Barry has somehow managed to cough up his actual wedding ring in the vastness of their apartment and decides to promptly pull it on a chain around his neck and wear it on their next outing. It’s enough to propel Hal into a coughing fit when he finds the golden metal glitter around the neck of the breath-taking seventeen year-old version of his husband that he really shouldn’t want but who looks increasingly irresistible as he loses all sorts of his composure over Wally’s impersonation of The Batman.

_His prayers have not been heard, as a member of Barry’s family, Wally has been amongst the first to be noticed. It **is** a train-wreck, albeit an admittedly beautiful one that Hal is very studiously recording for when Barry will – hopefully – be his normally-aged husband again._

When he finally realizes just what it is that has been looped around the neck of the young man on a relatively inconspicuous leather-band that is easily overlooked it is too late and they are outside where Hal cannot, without possibly causing a scene, demand the ring _back_ from Barry. And even though Wally does not comment on it, Hal can’t help but… feel off about seeing _his ring_ around the neck of a seventeen year old boy.

He can’t begin to deal with the mess the picture makes of his head.  
And he really doesn’t want to have to deal – any more than he already has to – with his unhealthy and unnatural attraction towards said _teenager_ , for crying out loud, never mind the normal circumstances.

Barry doesn’t remember the normal circumstances.  
That, in and of itself, should void all feelings of desire due to logically applied parameters.

If only it would work that way.

 

-

 

The realisation that Barry is actively _tempting_ him, however, only sets in roughly a week later, when he has spent about four nights wide awake on the couch, trying to go to sleep in spite of Barry’s rather vocal enjoyment of his showers – Hal remembers those timid, shaky cries, they fuelled him time and time again – and has needed to find increasingly ridiculous ways to not give in to the lure of Barry’s skin while the blond himself is resorting to increasingly outrageous manoeuvres to make it shown.

Hal is almost certain that Wally is an accomplice to his plans and will skin the red-head at a later date.

Leaning against the small sliver of uncovered wall in the kitchen, Hal is having his second cup of coffee for the day – it’s barely even five a.m. but he’s fought for sleep all night and he’s given up trying to reach that sacred place of dreams and instead, as he’s been doing during all his waking hours recently, is mulling over the reason why Barry has been acting so out of character lately. Just yesterday he’s been strutting his slender body around in _denim shorts_ , of all things – he doesn’t own any, which is why Hal has been thinking strongly on Wally’s involvement – one of Hal’s flannels, sleeves rolled up past his elbows and a pair of beat up Martens that… yes, belonged to Barry and a phase that he loved to call _Nevermore_.

Now while he hasn’t made it a point to actively bend and dance around Hal, it has been enough to see the vast expanse of those slender, pale legs be encased in sturdy leather and bleached out denim, upper body covered in _his shirt_ and the ring that has taken up permanent residence against his sternum dangling from his neck.

And just _now_ , in this moment that he puts the cup to his lips does he realize… the blond might put up a rather convincing air of innocence, but he _knows_. Like hell would he put that shit on if he didn’t know that they wouldn’t be going outside where _everyone can fucking see him_ and test Hal’s barely existent patience – or restraint when it comes to his possessiveness – and smile at the women and men passing by, glinting teeth contesting with the beautiful glitter of gold around his neck.

The little shit has been tempting Hal.

-

 

“If you are going to wear that, I will not restrain myself – even in Grandma Garrick’s presence.”—he threatens in a bland voice. “Don’t try me; you don’t know my absolute lack of discipline when I really don’t feel like it.”

Wally has invited Barry over to a Family Lunch this Saturday and being who he is Barry has neither been able to deny Wally a request nor himself the pleasure of finally knowing – Hal, given that he is well aware of how _safe_ the Garricks are in pretty much all and every regard, has agreed to come. Mostly because Barry has literally no idea how to get there; but there’s also Grandma Garrick’s absolutely delicious cooking that he is never in his life going to pass up.

And while he would never do that to either of the old coots – he does have morals, they’re just very well hidden and this Barry doesn’t know that – he is also not about to subject them to Barry’s current disregard for social norms and dress codes.

The blond gives him a very pointed look as he defiantly snaps the damn _crop top_ over his head and pulls it around until it sits. Hal is _this close_ to blowing an actual valve. “Fine.”—the teen answers with a visage that is definitely a smirk.

Hal knows when he’s being challenged.  
He’s just always had creative ways of responding.

Which is why when John Garrick opens the door to his humble home, what he finds is Barry Allen in denim shorts, converse and a crop top, with Hal Jordan hanging around his neck, unabashedly sporting a green dinosaur Kigurumi – complete with the fluffy shoes.

“He wouldn’t change.”—the brown-haired man says by way of greeting. “I had to adapt.”

The Garricks are unique people and neither Barry’s crop-top nor Hal’s plushy full-body suit really fazes them once they’ve drank in the sight and the Lunch passes by without much fanfare and the usual banter bouncing around instead. And it’s actually fun, walking around in public with the way they’re dressed, the second time around – he’s had time to adjust to the incredulous stares they’re getting and given the positive support from the older couple and a crowing Wally.

“You didn’t come through on your threat though.”—the young man says by way of conversation once they’re back behind closed doors and Hal has stripped out of the costume. And Hal, who’s kind of had it, gives the boy a smirk that has worked wonders on his Barry to a point of red-faced stuttering and he watches with almost malicious glee when it works just as well on the seventeen year old, if not faster than he’s used to, as he shrugs into his jeans, but throws his shirt to rest over his shoulder.

“No.”—he agrees, voice a good degree darker than he has usually kept it when around the young man. “But what does it matter when I can get you to show your hand?”—he prowls closer towards the pale, shining figure of Barry, illuminated by a stripe of afternoon-light painting crooked squares onto their hardwood floor.  The column of a throat jumps under a swallow and his own chest fills with something dark and victorious – maybe this is how Hades felt. “What does it matter, when you can get this red for me?”

And he is.  
Hal hasn’t even _touched_ him yet and the colour sits high on the other’s cheeks disguising itself as the low sun painting a pretty boy’s face. He steps closer quietly, watches the flutter of skin where it rests over the pulse and Barry is so skinny he’s certain he could count the heart-beats if he looked hard, but he is too fixated by the heavy quiet blanketing them that isn’t even broken by the hum of vibration he’s so gotten used to hear from his love.

“My God.”—he taunts, careful to keep his tone dark, but always warm when he is so close that he can feel the heat of the young man, almost a head shorter than him instead of the barely-there distance and Hal’s mind flashes to the effeminate nature that this version of his husband exhibits so brashly. He wonders where it could get him as he rounds the shivering, slender, angles of the blond. “Look at you, shivering like leaf from only a few words.”

Temptation claws at him from the inside, rolling like hot waves from a central point somewhere low in his gut and he knows that he will not take the boy to bed; not yet – not when he doesn’t remember. But that is not going to permanently stop him from enjoying from toying with a seventeen year old version of his husband that has just realized how big the piece he chewed off really is. Hal touches the knuckles of his right hand to the spinal ravine that curves along the toned back of the runner.

“Silver like a poplar leaf, aren’t you, _princess_?”—and as he asks, he draws his knuckles upwards, feels the difference in temperature between them, the unmarked, soft skin under his hand, the tremble of the body before him. He delves into the goose-bumps showering over the skin that is so blatantly shown off for his convenience and drowns in the soft sound tumbling over lips that he cannot see. It’s a cross between an exhale and a swallow and it’s so beautifully stilted and choked off that Hal wants to lock it away in a glass vitrine for the rest of his days.

And then create more of them.  
But instead, he does what a good husband does and, splaying his hand fully over the naked skin under his hand, smooths it up and down-ward in a placating motion as he steps closer, succumbing a little and pressing his lips to the blond crown, easing out of the situation.

“Barry,”—he finally starts into the silence, when the other has regained his breath and stopped shivering, hands calm at his side. He’s still behind him, still brushing gently over his flank but never straying from his path, no matter how badly his hands really want him to. “-you know why I won’t take you to bed?”—he asks quietly.

The young version of his husband hums and nods quietly, but still leans into his body, soaking up the nearness – Hal wonders if maybe an unconscious part of Barry actually remembers, and demands the nearness of his husband just as Hal does. It would not – per se – surprise him; having his husband locked in the mind of a seventeen year old.

“Because I’m a virgin.”—the young man answers petulantly and… yes, that’s _part_ of it, but like hell is he going to make his husband uncomfortable about being a seventeen year old Adonis with a V-Card. So he shakes his head instead and pulls both his arms around the blond, cradling him in an embrace that could be innocent.

“Because you don’t remember ten years of your life, Barry, and I’m not going to rewrite them or muck up your head any if I can help it.”— _even if I would really like to see you under me_.

He doesn’t sleep properly that night, but given the fact that Barry is just as uncomfortably awake next to him while they are binging _Gravity Falls_ like they’re eleven years old and don’t understand the references, he thinks it might actually be fine this time around – they don’t exactly speak to each other and when somehow they nod off together, there is none of the wired strangeness between them in the morning like there has been before.

Hal makes a point, in the following days, to casually, but carefully, touch the young man when he can get away with it – keeping it respectable as far as he can while Barry makes it a point to at least _not_ give him bedroom-eyes consciously any more. It would seem, however, that he has developed a liking for the denim shorts.

_And Hal will bite his tongue before he says anything about that at all._

 

-

 

So maybe this should be a story about Hal getting to know his husband better, to get to know the youth that the man he loves has once been – apparently right smack in the middle of his _Nevermore_ phase that Hal has always been ridiculously curious about, given the fact that Barry has always been surprisingly tight-lipped about it – and in a way this is exactly what happens.

Barry Allen, seventeen, has barely any control on his impulsiveness, or his brain-to-mouth-filter, but even when he is dressed in harsh silver spikes and heavy leathers, the man is nothing but world’s biggest teddy bear who will, even in aforementioned gear, bend down on a knee to let a curious kid poke around on the spikes on his shoulders while they are waiting for the mother who’s lost them in the mall to arrive and _not_ cry if they can help it.

He even gets the kid some ice-cream and Hal doesn’t think that he’s ever seen a mother so uniquely surprised as this brunette lady when she arrives at the Info Point to find the man who found the kid braiding her hair into a crown while she gives the leather choker around his neck a thorough inspection.

_Hal likes the leather choker; he’s sworn to find a way to make it stay._

Barry is, not surprisingly, a gentle soul who will go _lengths_ to make the world a better place than he’s found it and he loves Central City already, unequivocally, in a way that lets Hal know that it’s not just about the memories of his passed family that he seems to have stored away in the corners, back-alleys and nine-to-fives around the streets, but the city itself. The blond greets and treats it as a living entity, a breathing being – _she_.

But then there are evenings too when the younger man will join him on the couch for some much needed physical reassurance that is so much more obvious now than it has ever been while his husband was twenty-seven and could pass it off as simply being cuddly. No, _this_ , the stealing into the room and blanketing Hal without a word said between them, the burrowing under his chin, the _clutching_ – this is something that he is ashamed to say he’s never noticed before.

His husband has always been a haptic person, yes; he’s just never made the connection between a life largely led alone and the need to touch. So when Barry comes for his daily bouts of hugging – _sheltering, hiding, caring, protecting_ – Hal makes a conscious decision, each and every time, to pull the man in, into his arms and into an embrace, to will the warmth of his own body to transmit to Barry’s on every millimetre that they touch, to curl around the somnambulant form of the blond once he’s fallen asleep and cover him with an extra blanket he’s taken to drape over the back of the couch just for these occasions.

If Barry-17 is anything like Barry-27 then it will be no use trying to get him to talk about whatever pulls him towards Hal for this – but that is fine, for now.

It feels good to be there for Barry; even if he might not remember it. Hal can’t seem to count the many times when his husband has scraped his sorry posterior from whatever piece of pavement he’s been slung onto, only to stand up again and find himself with a few more broken bones for his attempts at helping; he hasn’t forgotten, but he’s decided that he needed, for the sake of their sanity, to ignore, the number of times when he would return from Oa, unannounced, to find that Barry would always cook _extra_ , lay a place for him on the table because he just _might return_.

They don’t really do Quid Pro Quo – their relationship could not work like that and Hal is all too aware that the only reason for that is himself; if he weren’t in Space all the time, if he weren’t such a fuck-up, if he were more careful on missions and didn’t get hurt so often, if he weren’t the literal punching bag of the JLA because _I’m a Green Lantern, I can take it_. There’s so many reasons that Barry has, very early on, disabused him of the notion that any sort of relationship between them could possibly operate on this level – it’s true, but that doesn’t mean he’s not enjoying the current moment as a chance to repay his husband.

 

-

 

Those sounds are not _good sounds_.

Hal knows Barry’s voice, he knows it when it’s _ecstatic_ and he knows the difference to _pain_ , however slight it may be – because Barry is at least as stubborn as he is sometimes and would rather suffer than actually admit that something did not feel kosher. And even as the man is writhing in his arms, pushing pelvis and spastic arms included, that is pure _pain_.

“Bear.”—he calls softly, pushing back into the cushioning of the couch to get at least half an arm’s distance between them, try to find the face of his husband – he has the advantage in dark settings, eyes used to the sombre ambiance that Space can often be but Barry’s wiggling voids all advantages he might have. Hal sits up.

“Barry.”—he tries again, gently puts a hand to the shoulder of his blond trying to wake him with no success. “Hey.”—he resorts to babbling; it’s what he does.

“Hey.”—Hal pushes a soothing palm down the heated flank of the younger man, feels the rapid beating of the heart when his hand rests on the ribcage shortly, before continuing its motion as he straightens up. “Hey, it’s okay. It’s a dream, love, I’m here. It’s okay. You are safe here.”

The blond has always found it oddly hilarious that Hal would resort to soothing babble when in an unknown situation that could be potentially harmful to his loved ones but has always encouraged it in his own way whenever catching him doing it. Hal strokes over the slightly sweaty blond hair – and promptly stops.

Because it’s _longer_ than he knows it has been when they went to sleep.  
What the actual fuck?


	3. ... the one where Barry gets de-aged Pt. 2 (M)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> ...and Hal gets hit a lot (poor muffin)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This took a direction I had not foreseen - sorry? Careful in the reading if you may get triggered by suicidal/ self-harm/ abusive implications.

As it turns out, the spell reverses itself. More or less.  
Because unlike what would happen if it were one of Zatana’s shenanigans or, as he’s been taught, Direct Orderly Magic this piece of work is a product of Chaos Magic and, as such, doesn’t (a) necessarily follow any kinds of set rules or (b) make it easy to reverse. Where a well-spoken command from the witch could undo what she has done, this bugger can’t and won’t be.

Barry is nineteen.

Still as pale and gangly as he’ll ever be, but he’s reached his full height – the very size that Hal knows him in, a little slighter than years down the road, but they see eye-to-eye now; in a literal sense. Not so much in a figurative sense because Barry, waking up disoriented, had promptly socked Hal in the jaw, causing the older man to react by pushing the blond off the couch and into the wooden table stationed before it. Needless to say, both their heads hurt albeit for different reasons and with varying pain hearths.

He hasn’t even gotten to talk to the idiot yet; which is unforgivable considering Wally has only been present because Barry had invited him for Sunday Brunch – they’d overslept, as Barry is wont – and found themselves shocked into the realm of the waking by the bell, causing aforementioned ruffle.

Wally has pulled his uncle aside to note any differences and to make sense of the situation, while Hal had pulled the phone to clear up some questions he was only partially certain where due to sleep deprivation and distorted eyesight. Zatara lets him know that his visions might just correspond with the truth. He’s smarter now, at the very least.

Unwilling to push Barry’s comfort boundaries – he’s viciously defensive of them at twenty-seven; almost too much for there not to be a mostly horrifying reason that Hal takes his time asking about – Hal takes the time to wake-up and prepare Lunch. It’s not often he has the luxury of being on earth and comfortably being able to selfishly hog the shower; although he absolutely loves standing under the hot spray with the blond still half-asleep in his arms, more dozing than showering and would give his life for those precious memories of the first times it happened. The shower is undeniably his most favourite place of the entire apartment – first, even to the bedroom. Yet Hal likes to sometimes just not have to think of the functionality of showering, or think of showering maybe a little bit colder to reserve more hot water for the other.

They’re not going out today though and who knows how long it might take Barry to come out of the bedroom where he’s sequestered away with Wally so standing in the water until it runs tepid is not something he has to feel ashamed for – today.

Only when shaved and quickly combed does he return to the rest of the apartment, pulling at a reserve of one of his husbands clothes that sit, maybe, a little tighter on him than they do on his blond, but serve just the same.

_And maybe Barry admitted, once, that he really likes to see the material stretch over Hal’s body – and maybe that is enough incentive for Hal to, sometimes, pull on a shirt that he might otherwise forego for being too small; only to make Barry’s eyes get that extra ounce twinkly in the morning._

Brunch is going to be supremely late, he notices when his eyes catch the Yellow Daisy clock on the wall – it was, apparently, a house-warming gift from a former team-mate – but for that alone, he thinks defiantly as his eyes catch on the groceries from Friday Evening, made in preparations for this very meeting, it is going to be just as supremely sumptuous. And he’s just done with the Frittata when Wally and nineteen year-old Barry Allen slink into the living room and towards the grand buffet in its centre.

“Whoever gives me a hand with the eggs and gets dibs on the Fudge!”—he lures and is not really surprised when Wally abuses the power of speed to practically yank the Frittata from his hands – gently though, because it’s still _food_ – and cart it to the living room and the rest of the buffet.

Barry stands a little ashamedly in the doorway. “I can at least help you with the plates?”—he offers oddly quiet, but Hal takes what he can get even though it feels as though he’s just been vaulted back to Square One – like in that Snakes And Ladders game that makes everyone cry at least once in their life. He pulls his vaunted Military Discipline tighter around himself and buckles up; if he’s going to have to wait until Barry feels safer then so be it.

 

-

 

His Not-Husband almost knocks him out cold on the second morning as well; Hal doesn’t even have the presence of mind, yet, to retaliate given that he is already awake enough to not respond immediately and instinctually, but still too asleep to have his brain formulate a proper response to that.

“Shit!”—the blond yells when he realizes who it is that he punched; again. “Shit – sorry – I – _fuck_ – um… jumpy. Sorry. Wait. Let me-“

Hal gets a Cool Pack and a truckload of excuses that he can neither compute nor really muster any interest in – he’s rather sorry for the coffee he had to spill in order to not burn his own face off to be quite honest; but Barry has already started to mop the liquid up like some nervous sixties house-wife and there’s a new pot brewing and Hal really wonders what the hell could possibly have happened to Barry Seventeen to make him turtle up so badly and punch strangers in the face when they haven’t even had their coffee yet at nineteen.

He stops the younger man’s frantic tirade about his own clumsiness with a carefully announced hand to his shoulder and gives him a soft, if thorough, look. “Good morning, Barry.”—he greets with a grave voice and the edges of a clean dishrag hanging into his vision and over his mouth. “Do you remember me?”

The blond nods his head hesitantly and, hey, it’s a start – despite the fact that Hal is not one-hundred percent convinced of the answer. There’s a possibility he’s messing with Barry’s memories even when he doesn’t intend to and finding out will need a lot more delicacy to the prodding than he can cough up now; so it’ll have to wait. But it’ll also need to be addressed at some point.

“Good.”—when he removes the Ice Pack from his face to turn it and press a cooler spot to the swelling skin around his eye, Barry flinches visibly, guiltily and Hal doesn’t understand, but he can’t see his husband like this either. “Maybe I should just remain lying on the couch in the mornings.”—he tries to joke, “My face would certainly thank me.”

There’s a look of horror crossing the pale face of the other man that lets Hal know just how wrong a move this was – but it’s too late by then and Barry is already excusing himself again, flittering through the kitchen like a Fly on Speed dead-set on righting a wrong that Hal doesn’t think has been done to him.

 

-

 

It clicks some time into the third day of Barry-19.

For a change, his face is not being put into misery – neither, however, is he put out of it – but it’s a close thing, barely averted by Hal’s adaption to his husband’s recent jumpiness and propensity to what he thinks is self-defence by launching a pre-emptive strike. And Hal doesn’t know where it comes from, but he figures, somewhere into his Cereal Breakfast that he is stubbornly munching on in front of a Children’s Series he doesn’t even follow what with the path his thoughts take, that Barry has, too, jumped a year basically – and Hal hasn’t been there for whatever happened while he was eighteen.

And it, really, cannot have been any good.

Barry has described himself as _jumpy_ on that first morning of him in is nineteen year-old glory, but throughout the day, Hal has realized that it is a lot more than just that.

His husband is afraid.  
And it’s the kind of _afraid_ that makes him check the door through the spy even when nobody has knocked or rang it; it’s the kind of afraid that makes him pull his curtains and patrol the windows; it’s the kind of afraid that makes the younger man jump up form wherever he is if Hal gets too close for comfort. It’s the kind of afraid that doesn’t just happen from one evening of Horror-Movies; it’s the kind of afraid that comes from a really bad run.

Hal hasn’t been there for his husband when it happened, obviously he couldn’t have been given the fact that he doesn’t even have any clear memories on where he has been while Barry was eighteen – probably in some country, getting blasted with lead – but he can be here now; has to be. Because like hell is he going to let that shit fester and impair the love of his life forever. But since he hasn’t majored in psychology – hasn’t gone to college at all, to be honest, he’s not the same kinds of smart his blond is – he is going to have to play this by ear.

And while he would love to take Barry out and bring him to The Flash Pound, a small sanctuary for those critters left alone in a moment of panic never to be found again if it weren’t for the fastest man alive, the other can barely _look_ at the streets from the security of his flat; Hal doubts he could walk them. So he goes the other way around, because Barry needs puppies to cuddle and confide in – he knows his husband, trust him on this one – and enlists the help of Wally and his rag-tag team of Young Heroes.

Considering how much Barry trusts Wally, at all points and moments in his life, and how much Wally trusts that Hal really does love Barry, Hal is convinced that his plan will work – even if the apartment is going to be flooded with little dogs for a day. He will take a younger version of his husband lying prone and covered by little Beagle bodies over a near-to neurotic-paranoid man that makes play at not being afraid of him.

_Hal has always honestly hated the look that Barry gets sometimes – he’s never understood it, but he has some semblance of an idea now. However unsolicited it came about._

 

-

 

“You’re not curious?”—Barry asks one morning without preamble and it’s a little too early for this because Hal’s coffee cup is still half-full and his Cereal hasn’t even reached that point of perfect sogginess that will allow him to wolf it down without much ado, but Hal forces his grey cells into action and gives the other man a look.

“If you’re talking about your… _jumpiness_ …”—he starts, “-then _yes_ I am. But I’m not going to push my questions on you when you can barely manage to let me greet my morning without trying to put me six feet under first.”

Barry is better about that, he notices.  
He hasn’t tried to hit him today either though.

Hal pushes a spoon experimentally at his Cereal, trying to discern the progress. “And pushing in general is just… lame.”—he groans. “Like: You tell me when you want to and if you don’t then you don’t. So long as we both find a way to live with it and each other I don’t see the deal.”

He doesn’t – not even with Barry-27, the true husband, who has, to this day, his secrets and mysteries and bad memories he doesn’t want to talk about, just as Hal does. Their relationship works because when they decide to be open about something, they are and when they need their quiet about a subject then it is just as easily granted. Hal has always thought that he would need one hundred percent clarity-truth-transparency with his partners when all it took was Barry and the realization that it’s really just about how much of your trust you are willing to put into the hands of another. Hal is one for going all in; Barry does never disappoint.

While his answer doesn’t magically get the younger man to trust in him from one moment to the other, Barry does lose some of the itching in his veins around Hal – he watches, certainly, but where it has been a fearful kind of watching before, he gets the feeling he’s being assessed now; tested to see if his words hold true. Hal has every intention to break the high-score.

When Barry dares to join him on the couch in the evenings for what Hal has realized is likely his favourite Good-night show ever since childhood, he offers the separate blanket that he’s tended to keep around for the cuddly times of Barry-Seventeen to the blond in silence and remains seated exactly where he is and learns.

For starters, that Barry doesn’t like touch.  
Where Barry Seventeen has taunted him to touch by flaunting as much skin as he possibly while remaining at least semi-presentable in public, Barry Nineteen hides his body in wide materials that will not show even the tiniest sliver of skin outside of his hands and his face.

Barry, too, is very choosy about sound. Too quiet and the ants return to the insides of his feet and his hands, no matter how much he tries to force his limbs into stillness, too loud, however, and even the much vaunted control he has over his body, otherwise, betrays him, makes him jump in his seat however minutely, like a startled cat, before his shoulders move up inch by inch, almost unnoticeable if one isn’t looking. Like Hal is.

What is indefinitely worse, however, is the fact that Barry seems listless.  
His riddles don’t interest him, the Sudoku is left unanswered on the breakfast table where Hal leaves it out of habit, there are no questions and all sense for mystery has vacated the premises that is Barry Allen as if in an emergency.

His husband is a husk of the teenager that he once was, and even though Hal can be patient as ever loving hell, even though he doesn’t need to _know_ – he can’t help but wonder how Barry will manage to recover from whatever has been done to him.

 

-

 

“I’m really not alright.”—Barry bites back with some semblance of a choked off smile in his voice. “I’m panicking and no amount of you telling me the contrary, it is going to change the fact.”

Hal sighs loudly in his awkward position, but smiles despite the situation at the caustic comment. _This_ is why Barry usually organizes their Garrick-Meet-Ups – because he knows how the metro works and will chose a time of arrival that does not coincide with an inhuman amount of bodies flooding the compartments of the train. Barry is not fond of the press around him but Hal has managed to manoeuvre them into a corner from where Barry can observe most of his surroundings and positioned himself at half an arm’s distance from the blond to create some room for him. He’s only partly successful, but his cursing seems to entertain – and therefore distract – his husband, so there’s that.

“Look I’m sorry.”—he says, exhaling harshly on the last syllable when he compensates for an elbow to his back. “If you want to we can get out on the next stop and walk the rest.”

It would be one hell of a walk, granted, but he could always call Garrick and let him know. Barry, however, shakes his head.

“Better inside.”

 

-

 

“He’s older.”—is what Garrick says to him when he pulls him out of the living room and onto the back-porch with a stern face that Hal hasn’t even seen on him when he first came to ask for Barry’s hand.

The man is as close to his husband as a father could possibly be, especially considering that Barry himself has never had the fortune of having a supportive family and Hal respects that – he just doesn’t know what he did to warrant this kind of reaction. He proceeds with caution; nods.

“I’ve been told that whatever was done to him will reverse itself on its own.”—he gives the older man his best, honest face. “I don’t know how it will influence his memories, of the years he’s reliving but… well. If Wally’s right then he’s nineteen.”

Garrick is a composed man, but in this moment, Hal Jordan is witness to a curse so foul and blue both of his Drill Sargents would have blushed and the Green Lantern finds his mouth dropping at it. Blue eyes catch his with angry determination as his hand settles around Hal’s arm like an iron vice.

“Honey, we’ll just be around the corner, don’t wait up for us!”—he calls inside and before he knows it, the sixty year old warhorse pulls him over his shoulder and Hal is subject to the uneasy sensation of a protesting stomach as he is blitzed from A to B.

Garrick drops him unceremoniously at a point of destination that is non-descript even as Hal looks around – if he old man is going to dispose of a body, this is the perfect place. “Listen here, bub, what I’m going to tell you I’ve sworn never to and if Barry ever remembers that he’s told me and realizes that I’ve told you I’m going to lose a son so you will keep your mouth shut about this, you get it?”

Hal nods.

 

-

 

They are quiet on the ride home; Barry easier next to him without the mass of human bodies pressing against his, invading his personal space and Hal still lost in deep thought about what he’s been told.

Knowing his Barry-27, the old man probably isn’t even kidding when he says that his husband has sworn him into a secrecy that might cost them both a family member if ever this trust is broken. Hal doesn’t want to be the cause for such a rift and he is going to keep mum about it like a dead corpse. He’s had suspicions before, yes, but having the more-or-less detailed version of Barry Eighteen – the one he’s missed – gives him images and insight that he would rather not have had.

Not that he would love Barry any less.  
Now and in the future, he knows that his heart is tethered to Barry Allen, Fastest Man on Earth and some other select Planets, and he will happily slave the rest of his life if that is the only possibility to let the man know just how much he loves him. There is not the slightest question of it, not even now, knowing what he knows – quite the contrary actually.

Because Barry hasn’t just had a bad run-in and it shouldn’t surprise Hal the slightest. His husband has never been one for ‘run-in’s rather than the ‘long runs’ and Barry 18 hadn’t been any different – except for the part where he had a long run with a nameless someone who had no idea what a treasure Barry Allen was and had single-handedly destroyed the vivacious beauty of Barry 17 until Barry 18 was apparently bad enough to warrant a cautiously concerned letter from the college in regards to Barry’s scholarship.

Barry 19 has been taken out of the program temporarily due to a psychological breakdown resulting in almost lethal injury to his femoral arteries. Barry 27 is healed from the scars that remain; Hal has always wondered why his lover was so unexpectedly squeamish about hands on his thighs.

_He’s also never going to bring up the choker. Ever._

 

-

 

The thing is: Barry is getting better.  
Marginally.

There are days, granted, when he holes up in his bedroom and nothing short of the Apocalypse could probably get him out of it – Hal has learned, in the first week, to leave sustenance at the doorway and be generally the quieter sort of flatmate on those days. But there are, too, days when the smile that Hal so remembers from his husband comes back around and paints the face of Barry 19 in a softer glow.

Hal makes more informed decisions about where to go and when in order to ease Barry into the public while, at the same time, making it obvious that he is always just going to be at arm’s length should the other ever feel need of him. In turn the blond will, in cases of emergency – see: a sudden and inevitable appearance of a large amount of bodies – rather push into his side and under his arm than stand on his own, despite the fact that he shakes so badly the first few times that Hal actively has to seek a quick exit before the panic attack devolves into the bodily harm of others. They don’t talk about it though; and that’s alright.

Until it’s not.

 

-

 

“This is a wedding ring.”

Ah _fuck_.

“Yes, yes it is a wedding ring.”

And of course it’s cuddling with its partner.

“These are our names.”

He doesn’t answer, but Barry is standing in the bathroom and he really does need to shower after his morning run because he’s smells worse than a polecat and this is not going to be a possibility with Barry 19 looking about as confused as a Labrador Puppy with the two golden rings in his hands. He’s not _bolting_ though so that might be a plus. Hal eases away from the door and makes for the kitchen instead. Barry follows on naked feet, waiting for an explanation that he doesn’t know how to give without some intel first.

“You remember your first day here?”—he starts the conversation carefully as he moves to prepare breakfast. It’s not going to be much, but he needs something to occupy his hands. The blond nods hesitantly.

“What do you remember from before?”—is the next question; because he hasn’t – in his efforts to make Barry feel _comfortable_ – even tried to sound the depth of Barry’s memories. It’s an error that bites him the ass right now as the younger man turtles up almost violently, giving him a defiant, hurt, glare over the kitchen island.

“You said you weren’t going to ask.”—the blond growls and… boy he _hates magic_.

Placating, he raises both his hands, palms out, and tilts his head to the right a little as he ducks – it’s an intuitive motion that he hopes conveys the unintentional faux-pas. “I’m not.”—he says, simply. “It’s just that, as I remember it, you’ve been living with me for about a month now. And before you were Barry Allen, aged nineteen, you were Barry Allen, aged seventeen.” This, however, only brings more confusion to the face of the younger man, left hand’s fingers twitching towards the rings in his palm as if to enclose them in a fist. Hal catches the movement.

“And usually you are Barry Allen, aged twenty-seven, and have been my husband for close to two years now.”

Naturally, and Hal can’t believe he’s been so negligent – he should have realized that Wally and Garrick both counted on _him_ to explain the situation; it’s his _duty_ after all… probably – this doesn’t clear up the confusion on Barry’s face and so Hal reaches for his cellphone, offering it up.

“Do you want to call Wally?”—he tries, “Or Garrick?”—because even though it hurts, Barry 19 trusts the both of them more than he does Hal when it comes to personal facts; surprisingly though, Barry shakes his head, left hand closing around their wedding bands.

“We’re married.”—he repeats a little unbelieving, as if trying to see if the information sounds any less ridiculous the second time around. Something about it seems to work. “You mean I don’t always stay like this?”

Stupidly, Hal’s first instinct is to ask ‘like what’ but he catches the words before they slip over his tongue and what remains is an apparently stupefied look that puts a blush onto Barry’s face and prompts his shoulders to hunch until his body is folded in on itself and resembles that of a Dog with its tail between its legs. He swallows heavily around the indignation that threatens to burst from his lungs, the tirade that has been waiting to explode from him ever since it has come to his attention that, currently, Barry doesn’t see much value in himself outside of that given to him by others. Hal shakes his head and announces the hand that he reaches out to touch at Barry’s left hand, enclosing the ball of fingers holding at the rings with his own hand.

“You don’t like big masses, still, but it’s nothing people would associate with you straight away; you don’t like… to be touched at certain places; and there’s a phase in your life you won’t talk about but-“, he gives the young man, now grown to the height that Hal knows and is familiar with, a soft, warm smile that hopes comes across as comforting and as he means it to be “-no, you’re not very much like this as I know you.”

For a few moments they stay like this, loosely connected to one another by the gentle grip that Hal has on his husband’s hand, before breakfast beckons and he turns to retreat back behind the kitchen island and to his cutting board.

Something occurs to him in the silence, however and when he asks, he turns around, holding half an onion in his hand: “You said you remembered who I was when I first asked.”—he starts. “How come you don’t remember that you were Seventeen?”

Barry’s blush returns. “I lied.”—he admits, right hand rising to wrap around the opposite upper arm. “Wally was very… _much_ at once and he impressed on me the importance of staying by your side because you were aware of the situation and I… misread?”

He groans at this and turns back, barely resisting putting his fingers to the bridge of his nose; no wonder the younger man tried to knock him out. “ _This_ is a trait I recognize.”—he finally says as he starts to cut at the ingredients in front of him, Barry edging into his field of vision. “Especially in situations you’re uncomfortable with, you won’t say a word and just ‘ride it out’ instead.” Hal gives the younger man a small glare: “It’s not good for you and therefore not appreciated, but I’m going to have to tell you when you’re back to your usual self and will actually remember.”

That small smile dances over the features of the blond as he pivots on his feet and stretches to plonk himself on the working area next to Hal, playing with the rings in his hands. “Tell me?”—he asks quietly and… this is the most inquisitive he’s been all week; like hell is the older man going to deny him.

 

-

 

Barry comes for physical reassurance. It’s not much – and definitely not of the same magnitude that Barry 17 would positively _vie_ for his daily pets and cuddles – but he will, sometimes, lean into Hal when he thinks he’s being stealthy, and when they’re out his fingers sometimes find Hal’s wrist or lower arm squeezing as if to reassure himself that the other is _still there_ , and when neither of them is awake in the mornings Barry will slink past him on his way to the bathroom, shoulder brushing against his clothed back like a cat rubbing itself against an owner in greeting.

He thinks that he might actually learn a lot from handling Barry like a cat. He’s shy, yes, but he also wants – needs – touch to ground him, Hal knows that now, and the stiller he sits, the more likely Barry is to come around, drawing his circles in the room, homing in on Hal like he’s a WiFi signal.

It would be funny if it weren’t so painful to watch his husband like this.

“I am not complaining,”—he starts one glorious evening when Barry has found the strength to actually bed his head on Hal’s thigh, “-but where does the sudden trust come from?”

The blond on his knee shrugs and pulls his own blanket a little higher over his shoulder when it slips off with the motion. “I’m married to you at some point in the future. There’s a reason for it and because I don’t think I’m dumb enough to make the same mistake twice, as well as having lived with you for two weeks now, I have reason to believe that you are beyond trustworthy. Now shush, Grunkle Stan is talking.”

The logic is infallible; technically.

It’s too bad that when Hal is awoken by yet another fist to his face, it’s obvious that Barry Allen – apparently aged twenty-two – has no idea about any of that.


	4. ... the one where Barry gets de-aged Pt. 3 (M)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> ...in which Barry is an ass

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Happy Thinking Day!! :D

“I’m too old for this shit.”—he moans quietly into his Soda that he wishes would at least be somewhat alcoholic.

The _upside_ of Barry’s current age is that they’ve already been in some kind of relationship by then – even though, granted, Hal had managed to botch it up monumentally already simply by being a Green Lantern and therefore needing to leave for close to a month right after the best night of his life spent with one Barry Allen.

It’s a period of their relationship he doesn’t like thinking back to because he’s always been inept at handling the utter rejection he felt when Barry wouldn’t greet him upon his return, and the dejection when he realized that it was his own fault. Needless to say he was utterly useless to the JLA at that point because his emotional circumstances started to impair his will-power and finding a new source of _will_ in the midst of battle when concentration was frayed at best was… difficult.

Here they are, however, with Barry still not buying – despite Garricks’ and Wally’s unanimous and sworn support of this – what Hal has told him about his current situation. Admittedly there are no indices to support his claim that he has, indeed, in the last month been subject to Barry Allen Seventeen and, more recently, to Barry Allen Nineteen and why is it that his husband is always screwed over whenever they’ve managed to reach an understanding?

His head hurts both from the mean right hook that Barry packs – he hasn’t felt it in _ages_ – and his back-head ricocheting off the kitchen wall where the Daisy-Clock has suffered and shattered. Incidentally it’s Hal who, inconsolable about one of the most treasured pieces of Barry’s possessions, has moved to collect its pieces before Barry could even ask him where they are.

“You don’t believe Garrick, you don’t believe Wally and you don’t believe me.”—Hal sighs and thinks for a second, or he tries to what with the pain pulsing through his head in a rhythm that feels like a wave-length but trying to visualize the thought makes him nauseous.

 _Interesting, he might actually have a concussion_.

“But you’re twenty-two and that means you’re already The Flash and have, therefore,”-he fishes for the work-phone somewhere to his right, his vision is blotchy at best and, yeah, likelihood of concussion is getting _likelier_ by the second, “-heard of Batman before and given your hero-wordship of him at twenty-five I dare say it’s even worse now. Ask him.”

_Call El Vespertilio_

Barry hangs up before the first ring has even gone through; Hal has difficulties looking at him but he thinks that there’s maybe a blush on the bridge of Barry’s nose.

“’s cute.”—he chortles, before he takes a deep breath, blinks and tries to straighten up sufficiently to regain some sense of balance. “’scuse me now, bear. I’m-a conk out on mah coush and ride ou’ tha’ c’n’cuss’n.”

He’s out.  
And he hasn’t even managed to ask Barry what he remembered yet.

 

-

 

“Oh Boy did he do a number on you.”

He doesn’t want to wake up, but there is Garrick’s gently tapping hand on his cheek and it makes the resounding waves of agony in his head spike for a second before he opens his eyes and actively groans – this is a bad idea. Close eyes.

Garrick snorts. “No falling asleep, you hear me? Didn’t know the boy would turn against you like that – he filled out the last few years.”

Didn’t have to tell _him_ that; he’s _well aware_.

“Okay, stop.”—Garrick’s hand is smoothing over his head, looking for what he has no idea. “You do remember you’re concussed, yes?”

Ooooooh, yeah there’s that.

“You go rest – I’ll wake you up in about thirty minutes. Any ideas how to convince your boy here?”

There’s the wedding rings in the bathroom. And he has evidence of Barry 17 bonding with Wally – ‘s a cute video too.

“You give them numbers?”

Don’t let Barry 22 know.

 

-

 

The concussion, as it turns out, is a blessing in disguise as Garrick, later, lets him know, because while Barry 22 was a tough nut to crack, he is still Barry and as such a largely rational person when he wants to be and – always – Central City’s number one forensic scientist. And the evidence, once he does look around, is clearly there.

Hal’s shirts with Barry’s shirts with Wally’s shirts.  
The videos of Barry Allen, clearly younger than now but dated only two weeks ago, losing his shit over a Batman impersonation.  
A well slept on couch that is apparently Hal’s; but an equally slept-in bed.  
Wedding rings dated two years ago.  
Photos of the wedding showing him older but definitely willing and exuberant with Hal.

Maybe, Hal thinks later when he dares to take a seat at the high kitchen-table, he should have had Garrick over for all the transitions – seems he does a better job about it. Barry is making something, Hal can’t quite see it, but it smells sweet and his coffee is already waiting for him; courtesy of Garrick, he’s certain, Wally was reluctant about giving a recently concussed man _coffee_ – he’s learning quickly in the new team. Barry would love to know it.

“How is your head?”

The dry tone surprises him, but he considers the fact that Barry 22 even talks to him a miracle of itself and dares a small nod.

“Singing me the Ode to Joy; but we’re getting there.”

Barry doesn’t laugh; which is a shame – usually any kind of larger knowledge that Hal lets on he actually has paints a surprised, small, _beautiful_ , smile on his face; or sometimes causes him to let out this awed chuckle. It’s a nice thing – Hal always wondered when it came about, but apparently he’ll have to wait around a little longer.

The blond turns and… he’s filled out alright. His body is just the way Hal remembers; tall, lean but muscular and pale even in the noon sun. What Barry 19 had forcibly weaned him off due to circumstances, Barry 22 snaps right back into his mind and Hal can’t help but recall the way he’d first shook under him; the way he’d felt around him; the tiny noises he half-swallowed, half lost from between his parted lips.

“Why do you marry me?”

The question is angry, direct and accompanied by the clanking of a plate in front of him, revealing an Egyptian Omelette with Honey, Nuts and dried Dates – Hal furrows his brows.

“Because I love you.”—the answer is simple.

“You left.”

And yes, yes Barry 22 would remember that night and he would, naturally, come back to Hal at precisely that time when Barry had gone from ignoring him to bestowing him with painful jabs that stabbed him in the heart more often than not. Hal takes a deep breath through the nose.

“Yes.”—Because there really isn’t anything else he can say to that. “And so will you when Central City calls, because that is how you work. And we’re going to have this discussion a lot in what will be the next year for you… memory wise. Ultimately, though, I love you and I’m going to marry you for it and I’m not going to stop loving you even when you suddenly get hit by a fucking spell and end up seventeen, nineteen and now twenty-two in varying stages of you having You-Issues that you’ll never tell me about which I only now come to understand.”

He’s relatively certain the spell backfired on this end because if the sound of Chaos Magic has anything to do with its intent then he’s sure as hell it’s not meant to give Hal the chance to see the darkest moments of his love’s life but that is how it works out for him. Mostly. Barry 17 was a welcome reprieve that he will forever hold dear in his heart; not lastly because of the Denim Shorts and his innocent enthusiasm.

This shuts the blond up; stops him short and Hal can see in the balling fists that it might not have been a good thing to say – but maybe it was the right thing to say in this moment. He’ll find out later, won’t he.

“Eat.”

Well… mono-syllabic conversation is still better than no conversation.

 

-

 

So, Barry is angry.  
But he’s also curious, despite his ire, and so turns into the most grumpy little detective Hal has ever seen – seriously he could base an entire series off the next week of Barry’s petulant riddle-solving, his huffing-and-puffing through the apartment that he starts to treat like an office he can vaguely remember, his foot-stomping coming to realizations. It’s hilarious.

You know… if he weren’t the source and therefore target of the bad mood.

“You realize Bruce Wayne is Batman.”—he says unimpressed over breakfast at some point into their second week.

Hal is going thin around the edges; exposed to Barry as he is on a daily basis, he has found out that nothing that he does will change the manner with which the blond will treat him and not only is it disheartening to have his husband behave like that to him, but it is an exercise in restraint to constantly remind himself not to rise to the bait and give the man a taste of his own medicine. But then there are moments like these… when it’s almost good.

Hal nods into his cereal. Barry makes a face at it.  
“’m not surprised you figured it out.”—he admits, still a little sleepy. “Thought you would when you were still seventeen.”

There’s a moue on the blond’s face that Hal knows, by now, to be the herald of potentially hurtful news and if he can he’s not going to encourage the man if he can avoid it. “You liked me when I was seventeen.”

And there’s something in his voice that’s just…  
“That’s enough. I’ve had it with you.”—Hal stands, angry and barely composed, but not yet at the point of yelling and even too tired to even muster up a truly loud voice. He’s tired. “You want to think of me like that go ahead, I can’t stop you. But since you’re the fucking scientist of the two of us, tell me this: if that’s really what’s going on, how come I’m not looking at anyone else, huh? You’re a monumental asshole right now Barry Allen and Lord help me because I’m the sod who’s been stuck with you.”

“Oh, here we go.”—the man taunts, sneering, triumphant over something that Hal doesn’t quite know. “Show me the extent of your love, Jordan. Why don’t you. I’ve been dying to see it.”

He’s not a violent person.  
But he wants to bash the fucking sneer of Barry’s face.

“You _asshole_.”—he says with a lot of feeling behind it; because it _clicks_ suddenly. “You’ve been channelling fucking Satan for the last two weeks because of _this_?”

Quiet.

“Oh my god I’m going to lock you up and brainwash some social skills into you, what the ever loving shit?”—he raises his face from his hands. “Barry, that is not how you people. I am going to sit on my couch now, eat my perfectly soggy cereal and think about what exactly I am going to do with a suddenly abusive you – seriously how the hell did _that_ happen, what the fuck even? Barry-19 would never let it get this far.”

And it’s true, but even in his angered despair he’s not going to humiliate Barry any further by watching his face fall and all the wind rush out of his lungs as he grabs his breakfast and makes for the living room. He’s very obnoxious in watching Supernatural – Barry finds it inherently distasteful and won’t come near it with a Hazmat suit, so he’s safe. For now.

 

-

 

They don’t really get better.

Where Barry-19 has been a positive linear function, rising to a high peak, Barry-22 is hell-bent on turning that linearity into a bell-shape that would make Gauß jealous – and then some.

While they do reach something of an understanding in regards to Barry’s treatment of Hal – he’s stopped allowing it, which usually results in perfectly good insults being bounced off each other’s heads without much heat – all other sorts of relation between them remains strained and mostly angry.

Until lunch with Wally and the Garricks in which Hal comes to a surprising conclusion – or rather, is made aware of it.

“ _How_ do you manage to _lose_ a _fork_? For god’s sake it’s not even tiny or anything, it’s just a _fork_ and you didn’t even have to carry it far? Like, _what_ , are your paws too stupid to actually _hold_ something?”

“You know, you could just accept the _Sorry_ I offered, but apparently social skills don’t come with a degree in science.”

“Oh fudge you and your social skills. What social skills? Stabbing your husband with a fork?”

“Excuse the hell out of you but you are not my husband. My husband is a beautiful man with a big heart and all the social skills on this world and you don’t hold a candle to the brilliance of him.”

“I _am_ him.”

“Like hell you are. Twenty-two year old genius and he can’t even open his eyes to see a fork on the ground.”

“That you dropped.”

“So what? Get over it! Sometimes these things drop! They’re shiny and metal and for someone who makes money out of picking things up from the ground and putting them into tiny plastic bags to look at under microscopes later you sure suck at _looking at the ground and seeing a fork_.”

“You did not just insult my professional honour.”

“What professional honour?! I don’t know if you noticed but you’re currently not working what with you being _twenty-two_ instead of twenty-seven. And I’m not going to apologize.”

“Oh you act like a child!”

“Have you listened to yourself lately?!”

It’s kind of fun, actually; letting Porcupine-Barry know just what exactly he thinks of his behaviour and his nonsense without needing to filter it beyond siphoning out any actual curse words – for Wally and the old Garrick couple because while they will throw a lot at each other’s heads, they’re not going to (a) teach Wally new words – he’s already very prolific if he wants to be, or (b) shock the elderly couple into an early grave. Not, granted, that Hal thinks they actually could what with his recent discovery of Joe Garrick’s foul mouth. He’s still not going to incur the wrath of the Missus without due cause – and while riling Barry up is good sport, it’s not enough to warrant a hiding by the hands of Joan Garrick.

Even though... In all honesty, it is the woman in question who gives him a small smile and the shake of a head when he comes to bring in the dishes. “You two remind me of Joe and me when we were still in college.”—she sighs nostalgic and Hal listens up, because story-time has always been his favourite and Joan Garrick is a heaven-sent story-teller.

“We’d snipe at each other every chance we could get.”—at this, she sends him an eye-twinkling smile. “We only had a few classes together but we would go at the other’s throat over nothing. Shakespeare, Wolfe, the weather – what have you. He was of one opinion and that meant that I had another one that I needed to cram into his brain.”

Barry and Garrick are laughing about something Wally did; Hal can’t see the kid from his vantage point, but given what he knows about him it’s likely to be the recount of a mission – and probably one of Dick’s antics.

“You do realize that he’s sounding you out.”—she says then, eyes following his line of sight. “I didn’t realize it at the time, but Joe was about as capable with other people as he is with plants so it took me a little to figure out that he was actually interested but… well…”

Hal shakes his head as he turns it towards Joan and gives her a smile that he knows does nothing to hide the emotion his face conveys. “That’s not it, Joan, but thanks for trying to find a silver lining.”

For a second she looks like she wants to say something else, but, ultimately, keeps mum about it, waiting him out instead – it’s surprising how quickly the woman has adapted to handling the men in her life: Joe, Barry, Wally, even Bart and Hal. He doesn’t think that there’s a single one of them who do not fall into her lures of calm and open ears; and he doesn’t – for one moment – doubt that any of them would hesitate to lay their life down for her either.

“Look, Barry is… remembers differently. I don’t know if you’ve realized, but he _forgets_. He forgets that he was seventeen a month ago and he forgets that he’s been nineteen two weeks ago. It’s like he wakes up and whatever happened in his life at that point is his last point of data and he goes from there. And the last point of data in regards to my person – no matter how it will be in a few years – is me leaving on a mission after taking him to bed for the first time.”

She looks like a light-bulb is going up in her head. “I remember that time.”—she admits, biting her lips. “Yeah that was a bummer that period. Sucked for all of us, believe me.”

He does.

“So right now, what I have is this.”—he shrugs and turns his head to catch a glimpse of blond in the living room. “And it’s okay. It might not get any better right now, but that’s okay. I’m happy he’s still around instead of any place else.”

Not that Barry would have anywhere else to go but… well… it’s the idea that warms Hal’s heart on his lonely nights on the couch: that even though Barry disliked him something awful right now, he would still be there in the morning. It’s a small consolation, but it’s there. It’s enough – for now.

Joan reads him like an open book, though, and her hands twitch for a moment, as if wanting to reach out before she does, putting her small palms around his forearms. “I don’t know how we don’t say it more often, but you’re good for him, Hal Jordan. I’m glad that after all these years of loneliness, he’s found you.”

 

-

 

They don’t get better, but so what. Barry-22 is a monumental _assbutt_ most of the time – and Hal will take every chance he gets to call him that, if only to see his face redden with the indignation of it and barely containing his tirade about how _this is not a word, godfuckindamnitJordan_ – and Hal is having none of it and they snipe at each other over everything from breakfast to the down-time TV-shows being watched and Hal is actually surprised to find himself defending _Gravity Falls_ with his teeth, whereas the younger man will try to argument for other shows.

But in the end… Hal realizes that while he might have been right in correcting Joan, so had she been when telling him that Barry was sounding him out.

Having been at the receiving end of Barry Allen’s Super Social Skills Specials throughout most of his time with him, it hadn’t occurred to him that – these things too – had had to be learned and cemented in the mind until they become natural and in his own porcupine-person kind of way, Barry is trying to see what Hal is willing to tolerate, and what not. He’s said it himself hasn’t he? _Show me the extent of your love, Jordan. Why don’t you. I’ve been dying to see it_ – it may have been meant as a jab but… Hal should know better by now, shouldn’t he?

He’s lived with Barry-17 and Barry-19 and he’s managed to garner both their trust, in varying degrees, granted and it has, in both cases, been a _game_ of seeing what would work and what would not and the blond, for his part, has been mostly a recipient of Hal’s trial-and-error attempts at making him feel at home. But Barry-22 is an active participant; and intent on putting hurdles into Hal’s way to see which ones he would take to get to the other side and which ones are an absolute no-no.

Instead, they learn to live with the spikes of the other in their sides until the hurt that has accompanied the mere act of looking at Barry and being shown a literal cold shoulder eases in his chest and it turns into a competitive cohabitation that… yes: works.

So of course the Magic fucks it up again.

 

-

 

“No.”

Oh my god why is this always Barry’s first instinct for fuck’s sake – Hal ducks a punch and blocks another one and, taking the momentary relief he gets from his quick reactions to check on his husband, he comes to the conclusion that, _yes_ , he has changed.

“Bear, what the fuck?”

“Hal?”

He almost wants to get a hit in – just for retribution – now that the blond in front of him has stopped trying to rain punches on him, but…

“How old are you?”

“What?”

And Barry, bless his beautiful hide, he’s confused as fuck because (a) what he thought was an intruder turns out to be Hal and (b) the question seems to blindside him so bad that Hal could simply kiss him. But he also needs to know what’s what here so…

“Twenty-five?”

“God fucking-“

Of course. Of course.


	5. ... the one where Barry gets de-aged Pt. 4 (E)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> ...in which we're all good people, and Hal is so fucked

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> As stated: this was not supposed to go on this long, but it happened and I am not going to regret it because... well, it turned a little darker than intended too, and I don't actually have a lot of experience writing "darker" stuff even though it tapered out into something a little tepid at the end (I think) so yay :3 It's something :b

“Clear this up for me, one more time.”

His husband asks and, this time, it really _is_ his husband. Just… Barry-25, not Barry-27 – and while it’s a good start, it’s not ‘normal’ yet. Hal complies, gives him a rundown, gives him evidence, gives him Garrick and Wally to support his facts. Barry soaks it up with the composure he is so used to from his husband and it would seem that… two years from now, Barry, still beautiful, still himself, will have more lines adorning his face like Wild Wine a façade and his eyes will laugh a little more, but that might just be Hal’s imagination.

He can’t believe how _close_ Barry is to having regained himself fully.

“Are you alright?”—he asks quietly when, even after the newly arranged input between them, Barry is suspiciously quiet, gnawing at the knuckle of his thumb as if to shove something between his teeth and forcing himself into the silence. It’s a sign of the body that his husband has taught him himself; but the blond looks up from where he remains hunched over the white surface of the table, reflecting in the bright blue orbs of his man – the wedding band glinting at him, back in its rightful place – to give him a face of incredulousness. 

“I get the feeling I should be the one asking.”—he says a little quietly, long, tapered fingers framing the last picture that Joan has somehow managed to wrangle out of Barry-22 and Hal on her birthday. They are civil, shoulder-to-shoulder but he knows that the emotional distance translates subconsciously in the body language and his husband can read it effortlessly.

Hal leans forward, reaching without hesitance for a hand that is given to him almost as readily as he has initiated the touch and he’s so grateful – so beyond words – to have the ability, now, to touch and caress as he wishes and not fear rebuttal or panic-attacks or… other kinds of attacks. And because the giddiness of the situation makes him a little stupid, he gives the man a stupid grin and says: “I’m so damn fine and don’t you know it.”

 

-

 

Okay, so that might have been a premature statement which Hal may have to rescind at some point in the very near future because here he is, hiding the fuck away, in the bathroom for a reason that is only now revealing itself to him. He should have known better than this; good lord, he should have realized.

Hal takes a deep breath.  
He is so not fine.

There’s Barry-17.  
The coltish young man who flaunts his body at a man he deems somewhat trustworthy enough in order to sate an age-old need for physicality.

There’s Barry-19.  
The survivor who has realized that Barry-17 was too naïve and maybe too trusting in his approach to a world that could be cruel.

There’s Barry-22.  
The Flash who wanted, so badly, to leave behind Barry-19 and have the needs of Barry-17 met, but who’s set in the belief that he is going to have to do it on his own or fail.

Hal loves him; he does. Barry-25 and Barry-27 and he will still love Barry-178 and the Barrys 28 through 177 before that and any other Barry that might come after. He’s just not fine right now.

 

-

 

Hal is the model-husband that he never really has had the chance to be – or: that he had thought he would never get the chance to be. He’s realized, recently, that he could be the most modellest of all model husbands to his own very perfect husband if he wanted to and decided consciously, knowingly and willingly every day anew to make it so. It’s a realization Barry doesn’t know he helped along; can’t remember.

But Hal can; and he’s worked through the _in bad times_ -part like a champ to have this chance; to get every day with his husband again, to get to share and to show, to cuddle and to smother, _to have and to hold_.

Not surprisingly Barry soaks it up like a sponge – a dipped in a Lush-bath-bomb-bath, glittery, fresh, twinkly, pink, cinnamon-scented sponge and Hal’s fingers twitch at his sides to reach out and to cradle the blond to him and whisper all sorts of non-sensical reassurances to him, but he can’t do that. Because Barry might be aware that he’s gone through the earlier stages of his adolescence and young adulthood at Hal’s side, and yet while his husband is determined to move onward and return to his twenty-seven year old self, Hal is still processing the course of the last three months.

He can’t even bring himself to touch his husband beyond anything innocent and he is still sleeping on the couch, because that is simply the modus operandus he has adhered to in the last time.

It is obvious, however, that Barry can notice something is off. This is his husband they are talking about – clever shit that managed to undo Batman’s secret identity at twenty-two and no prompting from Hal – and he hasn’t married a man who doesn’t pay attention to him, after all.

“Tell me.”—he says one evening, poking his toe at Hal’s calf, wrapped under the same blanket for the first time in a month now, while giving in to Barry’s desire for _Rick and Morty._ It’s sometimes a mystery to him how his husband manages to pass as a functional adult being and part of the grown-up society. Hal has learned to chalk it up to the magic of Barry Allen.

“What? That the flux-generator is not actually a flux-generator?”—his answer is not even coherent with the situation; Rick and Morty is a Cartoon, fracking damn it, not the actual movie. Hal sighs when he realizes he’s managed to walk himself into a trap that, before he did, wasn’t even one. Barry switches off the TV and gives him his full attention – this is how Hal realizes that he’s actually fucked and will have to talk about it.

_Damn Barry and his Super Social Skills._

Hal takes a deep breath and doesn’t look at his husband. “I get that you can’t talk about what happened to you during certain periods of your life and I need you to know that no matter what happens, I won’t ask about them if you don’t want to talk about them.”

Out of the corner of his eye he sees the blond nod appreciatively and closes his eyes when he continues: “That being said – I’ve watched you go through what are presumably the hardest phases of your life and… contrarily to you, I am still working them out so right now… right now I really want to talk about things I don’t need you to talk about and it’s not doing my head any favours.”

He’s whiplashed – he realizes, quietly for himself. He’s dived into an unknown situation head-first because that is what he does for other planets so he thought he could just as well do it for his husband; it’s the least after all. But while other planets don’t necessarily always find a place in his heart, Barry has already been there for years and watching him suffer; watching him lose his own story again and again; watching him _forget_ and become so scared and disoriented that he would lash out physically at the first person he sees; watching him field his own troubles without truly accepting Hal’s help even though that is what he’s _sworn to do_. And that is leaving aside the people those Barries needed him to be.

“And what does that mean for us?”

Barry sounds a little hurt, but his face, when Hal opens his eyes, reveals that while he may be that, he is also concerned for Hal – and about to push back his own discomfort for his sake. Hal knows better now though.

“It means that right now I am the Windows Ring of Death-“ –Barry actually smiles at that and Hal hasn’t known what it would do to his heart, but he loves it, “-and it means… that I’m still going to be here for you. Don’t know how yet but you’ve still got two years to catch up on and I intend to be by your side for it.”

“And what about you, idiot?”—the blonde asks as he moves closer and pulls Hal into a slightly uncomfortable embrace that he can finally stop feeling guilty over and sink into. “I imagine you’ve extended your leave from Oa, but how soon will that be up? Will you even have the possibility to work it through? Hal have you thought about what it will do to you if you go to Space and you’re all _wibbly-wobbly_ in your head?”

He has – and the outcomes are not necessarily pretty, but if this is what is needed of him, then he’ll do it. Barry would probably be furious if he knew though. “Don’t worry about me, Bear. You get better and I will too, okay? So let’s focus on you right now.”

 

-

 

So Hal can’t seem to find it in himself to really touch his husband. It’s a little odd lying next to the blond at twenty-five – Barry has managed to convince him, through a lot of good arguments, to join him in the bed for the remainder of the ordeal – and having mental flash-backs of the man at seventeen, and expecting either a tongue-lashing of the highest order or panicked quiet from him that doesn’t come.

Mostly because his husband is an awesome piece of heaven that has somehow managed to garner corporeal form does he manage to fall asleep at night and – in the mornings – sometimes not panic himself when he wakes earlier than his love to find the other man glued to his side, wormed under or into his arms and between his legs. Sometimes.

He shoves Barry off rather forcefully the first time and is just as confused as Barry when the blond gives him a bleary-eyed, baleful stare of disorientation and Hal finds himself on the apologizing end of the equation.

As many things in this Odyssey, it would be funny if only…

But because Barry is tenacious as fuck and Hal is stubbornly working on the issues that his mind thinks are bad and important and what-not – his body is a most vehement protester, by the by, cold showers have been reinstated and Barry has found the Denim-Shorts – they manage to, at least, return to normal levels of physical intimacy so long as it doesn’t cross the line of public decency.

Hal almost cries when Barry leans up one day to press a mostly innocent – close-lipped, warm, dry, sunny, _ohmygodwhateven_ – kiss to one corner of his mouth; his heart beats so hard that Hal imagines he could see it through his shirt and he doesn’t really talk a lot in the five following minutes, but Barry looks uniquely pleased with himself as he links their fingers and continues to drag Hal around the Planetarium.

Joan and Garrick are ecstatic when visited by Barry-25 and a somewhat mellower-around-the-edges Hal who had made very concise plans about when to take the train where and what route to take and Barry is so relaxed and warm and safe against him that he wonders if maybe his own blindness to the issues might have made him unwittingly complicit in making Barry feel uneasy and on the edge. Maybe that’s why he would sometimes shake so hard in his seat or on Hal’s side that they had to stop and calm him down before he vibrated through the ground under him (yes, yes, it happened once, Hal has learned not to laugh about it).

And while Barry rolls in the feel of family – almost where it should be – Hal can’t help but wait for the snipe to come when he fails to catch the glass that Wally throws him in his over-enthusiasm to have his Uncle back mostly as he remembers him, even when the blond softly and with a careful hand on his elbow pulls him back from the red-haired whirlwind that rushes to clean up the mess he’s made. Hal can’t help but remain at half an arm’s length from Barry on their way back until the blond pulls his hand into his and his body closer.

It kind of sucks, but Hal is determined to make it better. If Barry can recuperate from that, then he really doesn’t have any business being such a wuss about it – he’ll deal. He’ll manage.

 

-

 

This is not… this… uhm…

 _“Hal.”_ –Oh God; he remembers that voice – oh holy crap, oh good lord, oh holy- “ _Hal.”_ —Aw fuck, _the eyes_.

“Shit.”—he cowers in the doorway, folds in on himself and raises his hands to hide his face, red, hot ears listening to the slick slide of Barry’s hand over his erection. “Barry.”

The blond – and he has the image in his head either way, even now when he isn’t looking – gives an appreciative moan from where he’s spread on their bed, the white sheets highlighting his flushed skin, the beautiful bend of his back on the covers as the sun glides over the pale expanse of his body and his scars. Hal chokes in the back of his throat, but finds himself looking up again, his new vantage point giving him an almost pornographically beautiful view of his husband – and it _is_ his husband, no doubt; his eyes can find the golden glint of the wedding band snugly fitted around Barry’s ring-finger, even as the tell-tale vibrations of The Flash take over the body of his love and he watches, breathlessly, as the bend of Barry’s body turns so sharp that he fears for the structural integrity of it, waits for the snap of a spine, before the man stills completely, all vibrations and movements halted, save for the involuntary twitch of his occupied hand around his spilling dick.

Fuck, but the man he’s married is a beautiful, sadistic, wonderful piece of shit.

Barry sits up, as if having heard his thoughts and gives him a heated stare that makes Hal think of the famed refraction period of the younger man. “You’re getting on this bed.”—the blond growls, “Or so help me God I am going to lock us in and masturbate until neither of us can walk anymore.”

He heeds the order, shaky-limbed and shivering, but he sits himself on the far corner of the bed, not touching Barry, but responding to his stare with a direct look of his own – he’s not certain he dares look anywhere close to the steadily rising erection of his husband but… there he went. He tries to swallow around the lump logged in his throat, but it’s to no avail.

“You’re shivering.”—Barry comments in a breathy rasp of tone that Hal _knows_ is a side-effect of the orgasm he’s just had. His husband hasn’t even bothered to clean up the mess and the pearly white streaks decorate his chest and the underside of his chin.

Looking down on his fingers, Hal checks – but it’s mostly to tear his gaze away from the alluring temptation that is the blond, now barely an arm’s length away from him; he realizes that the man is right. “Yeah, well…”—he tries to wet his lips, gulp around his heavy tongue just to get himself a little more time to think of something clever to say but he cannot _think with Barry just there_ and _like that_. His eyes return to the languid form of the blond – body too hesitant to engage yet.

“Are you good with watching?”

Hal nods; doesn’t want to push his own, or worse, his husband's boundaries any more than strictly necessary. Barry doesn’t ask another question and, instead, fastens his hand back around his need, slicker than before now, shiny and eager for what’s to come and in his lap his fingers tremble with barely-there restraint of wanting to touch but…

_It’s not fair. He won’t remember. It’s not fair to him._

Hal doesn’t.

“Can you-“—Barry’s choked off inquiry returns him to the situation at hand with abrupt vehemence and the blond – God, he’s always had a shorter fuse the second time around, just having come and he’s toeing the line here, Hal has seen it often enough to recognize – catches his eyes with his hazy Blues, head barely turned into his direction what with it being thrown back almost forcefully, “-Can you… touch?”

Of its own accord, his head shakes the negative and he almost regrets it when Barry’s needy whine turns into a frustrated groan-

-and then a nearly angry growl as the blond flips himself over Hal’s body and the Green Lantern into a mostly defenceless position and _bites_ at his shoulder with an aggressiveness reserved only for truly angry sex (they have that sometimes). Hal wants to protest, really, his mouth does all the movements and his vocal chords do all the noise it’s just not _coherent_ or _sensible_ and he’s no competition for Barry’s fast hands and fingers divesting him off his already very casual clothing before he’s as naked as the man above him.

“Barry-“

“Shut up.”—the blond glares at him. “I’ve tried seducing you the good-old fashioned way, and – seriously – what sane person can resist the temptation of _Denim-Shorts_? But it didn’t work so this little show of force will have to do. If you really do not want this, then you have the chance to say so _now_ otherwise I’ll go right ahead and there won’t be much opportunity in the next three to four hours.”

He sincerely thinks about it.  
His whole body is a shaking aroused-scared-fucked-up-impatient-barely-restrained mess of confused emotion and he wants this but also doesn’t and can’t quite answer, which is why he puts his hands to his husband’s shoulders for a start; because Barry, despite his alleged flightiness, has always grounded him.

Recognizing what must be turmoil practically jumping out of Hal’s eyes, the blond sighs and, carefully holding their bodies apart, lowers his forehead to the brunet’s shoulder. “You can step out any time, okay. I just…”—he looks up, catches Hal’s eyes, “—I haven’t had you in half a year, you ass. You just vanished for four months and I’ve been watching you now, but not having a chance and I just… I know I’m selfish and please forgive me for needing this, but I… I do. Need this that is.”

His hands are stroking over the sweaty, muscled back of the man above him, trying to soothe – he’s too riled up himself to truly be successful at it, but at least he finally knows where Barry is at memory-wise. He wouldn’t let Hal know outright; but the Green Lantern remembers that time of their relationship too, when he _left_ – again. Barry needs; Hal knows this and he wants to be there for him he just…

One last time, he swallows and, exhaling painstakingly slow through only a small ‘o’ between his pointed lips to give him more time to come to terms with the fact that – yes, he’s going to do that, he gives Barry’s flank an inviting upwards stroke, wrapping his thumb around the side to brush at a dark nipple.

“Go slow with me though, okay?”—he asks, not quite looking at the relieved face of his husband; not quite daring to let him know just how _fucked_ he is in the brain because damn it Barry is not going to remember this one.

Damn it.

 

-

 

Hal takes off his wedding ring when Barry 27 sits before him at the breakfast table. It’s a deliberate show with which he does it and the blond catches the action immediately, watching in forced quiet as Hal sits back in his chair and pulls his hands through his hair so hard it almost hurts.

“I need time.”—he starts; doesn’t look at Barry, because he doesn’t yet know how. “I promise that whatever it is, I will not let it come between us, because you are too damn precious for that, but I need… time.”

When he looks up, his husband’s blue eyes catch his promptly and unwaveringly, stubbornly loyal and loving; Hal’s heart revels a little in the look, siphons the image he makes – hair still askew, upper body drowning in the too large shirt that is Hal’s either way, neck-line frayed and loose – away for moments when he’ll need it. He puts down the coffee-cup he’s been sipping from and, equally demonstrative, takes off his own wedding-band, pushing at it with a pointed finger until it touches Hal’s.

“This is about… the last three months?”—he asks; and it’s more a statement than it is a question, but Hal nods in response all the same.

“I know… I know you can’t talk about whatever happened to you. I told you several times _then_ and I tell you again _now_ : I don’t need you to talk about it.”—he doesn’t, still. It’s weird how it is no hardship at all to put Barry’s comfort about his history before his own mental well-being; because he knows that while they are not exactly champions at it, talking about shit actually helps. But that is not them, and Hal is not going to force the change. “I just need to come to terms with what happened because, boy, did this fuck with my head.”

Time to admit it at last. “Like… I know, okay.”—he doesn’t quite know, actually, what he wants to express with this fraction of a sentence, but whatever sentiment he means to convey manages to get across to Barry, who nods. “It’s just something I’ll be working on in the foreseeable future.”

He reaches across, pulls Barry’s hand into his own. “And I’m happy,”—he presses a dry kiss to the bare knuckles, “-so very happy that you’re _you_ again; that you have the entirety of your history again. I am, Bear.” _Nothing worse than watching him forget_.

Barry’s hands frame his face, calloused fingertips rasping against his stubbled cheeks. “How bad will it fuck with your brain when I tell you that… I remember?”

“You mean… everything?”

His husband – oh God thank you it’s finally, _really_ , him – nods somewhat chagrined, stroking his thumbs and fingers over the bone-structure of Hal’s face and he wonders, for a fleeting moment, if he’s going through the Latin nomenclature.

“Is it only _now_ that you remember or…?”

The blond shakes his head comically quickly; whips it from side to side with wide eyes. “No-! I mean… yeah, uh. I only just now remember and _no_ , I was not lying to you while… younger about not remembering the before.”

He exhales and, softly, snuggles into the caress of his man’s hands. “Okay.”—yeah, it fucks with his head, but what’s a little more? “You were an ass at twenty-two.”

Barry chuckles, pulls him in for a much needed kiss, soft and unassuming, just like the first he’d given him a month ago – when it was still Barry 25 – but leaves the table between them. “You’re the one that gave me _numbers._ ”

“Yeah.”—he grins a little lost at the blond in front of him, blurry eyes sinking to the two golden wedding-bands on the table between them. “Yeah I did.”—he presses a warm kiss to the inside of the right palm against his cheek, holding the pale wrist in a gentle grasp. He’s fucked right now, but so is Barry probably. Either way, they will make it. They’re too fucking stubborn not to.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> R&R anyone? Con-Crit? (please? would love to know)


	6. ... the one where Barry smokes and Hal has a weird fascination with his fingers (M)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> ...in which peace of mind can take many material forms

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I do not endorse smoking; it is a disgusting, health-wreaking, money-eating habit that will make messes of beautiful people and if you have the chance, do avoid ever starting (take it from someone who's quitting)

 

Barry has a filthy habit.

He knows it too, but at this point of his life it just is what it is and he is not going to give it up – neither is he certain if, speaking from a mental point of view, he actually could.

Because he started when he was young; not-even-out-of-school-yet-young and it’s the kind of thing that he learned during his stay at the orphanage and one of the very few left-overs from then. He can even admit that, sometimes, it feels better sitting on the Fire-Escape or the roof of a fellow hero’s house (see: mansion).

Recently however, he’s had a frequent companion that, before, he can’t remember having had.

“You don’t even smoke do you?”—he asks Hal as he extends his neck, bending his head low to lick at the sticky strip on the OCB-paper held delicately between his fingers; his eyes are stuck on the shaking head of the other man.

Hal has been a little odd recently, returning from his self-imposed exile after… well, after Parallax. There’s the fact that he listens to The Bat – that he follows orders at all – or the fact that he’s quiet.

And then there’s the hair.

Admittedly Hal Jordan has always been a rather nice view and the Green Lantern Suit left very little to imagination – something that the speedster has always appreciated – but the hair… He will stand by the statement that it’s the hair that do him in; always have and always will. Joe and Wally are laughing at him somewhere he can’t hear them because they know he has a weakness for men who do well with long hair. _Hal Jordan does extremely well with long hair._

It’s maybe because Barry will, in these moments, look for – and find – the quietest place that their current position and situation allows for and take a few minutes purely to himself. As previously stated, it’s a habit he got into.

When he needs to think and revise;  
When he needs to plan ahead;  
When he needs to recapitulate what just happened…  
there’s a multitude of situations actually, now that he really thinks about it.

So he leaves the rooms that he knows are equipped against such frivolous behaviour – not many of them have the advantage of rapidly healing cells after all, it’s not like he actually will suffer any repercussions from this – and finds the cosiest nooks and crannies on the roofs around the places they go. Those that are warded against any strong wind and might still allow a far sight into the night or over the city (when the weather allows for it).

They’re on the Manor tonight; because while The Bat severely dislikes their presences in his much valued little corner of the world, he’s needed them and he’s not as much of an asshole since The Princess has slung him over her shoulder and taken him to bed for the first time and they are therefore allowed to remain at least for a few hours to recuperate and maybe discuss the League a little.

But Barry has felt the need to _wind down_ , which is why – under Alfred’s ever so discrete but watchful guidance – he’s ended up here, lounging against a chimney that is warm in his back and Gotham stretching out before his eyes. He’s not as surprised that Hal has joined him as he has been the first few times.

“Why do you always find me?”—he asks next and usually he wouldn’t, because he likes that he is the one person that Hal comes to when he can’t seem to tolerate the rest of them and he doesn’t want to _lose_ _it._ But his heart is a stupid thing and it plants false information in his head and he needs to know now, needs his stupid cardiovascular muscle to _know_ that this is not how Hal means it.

The Green Lantern gives him a slightly shocked look, notices their deviation from their usually quiet routine and Barry’s eyes catch on the lips of the other as his tongue slips over them, putting the finished cigarette between his own lips to hide his reaction. He wouldn’t mind knowing what they feel like.

“You’re usually quiet.”—the man says finally and… Barry hasn’t known that he’s missed the voice but it occurs to him that Hal hasn’t talked a lot recently.

He shrugs in response, lighting the cancer stick he knows he won’t exactly feel – _sometimes he misses the light-headedness that this act would be accompanied by in his earlier days_. “I can be.”—he allows and then falls into the silence that his companion is apparently craving, eyes drifting over the lazy blinks of light of the city.

Hal stays.

 

-

 

For some reason, and he knows that it’s an odd thing, Hal has always really liked hands; incidentally this has not changed with his stint as Parallax. If anything… it has shown him that even after such a thing he can still have these human carvings and feelings. Even if it is for something as stupid and trivial as hands.

Barry Allen is, objectively speaking, very pleasing to the eye – in as well as out of uniform and when the rest of the JLA tend to tiptoe around him or walk on eggshells, the blond has always made it a point to talk directly to him; loud voice, clearly addressed and everything.

And then there are the moments when he’s simply gone.

The first few times Hal’s only real intention was to find the speedster and maybe bring him back from wherever he was – mind- or otherwise. But as it turns out, the man has a dirty little secret.

One that Hal, with all his preference of hands, can whole heartedly subscribe to being disgusting and illicit, but has decided to partake in either way, because he gets to stare at Barry’s beautiful long, tapered, calloused fingers forming around the slip of paper holding and folding the tobacco-crumbs and the filter in it. It’s gotten to a point where, last week, he’s went out to buy some himself after a rousing nightmare and helplessly recreated Barry’s almost intricate ritual only to light the damn thing like a perverted incense-stick. _It worked, is the thing._

Which is why Hal finds himself coming along with Barry’s little detours to a small place without smoke-alarms, finagling tobacco, paper and filter into a small cigarette and having his five minutes of peace and quiet and not having another answer to it than: it soothes him.

…and quenches his thirst for looking at hands.  
Because Barry Allen has some damn nice ones and Hal would not mind knowing how they feel or taste.

 

-

 

The paper slip can’t be longer than his pointer finger, though it’s most definitely wider than it, the crumbs of light brown tobacco slipping into the premade crease in a dance of its own. The filter is carefully pinched between pink lips, careful not to be touched by the tongue but he picks it out with the tips of his fingers, holding his semi-finished cigarette aloft in his right hand as he carefully lays it to rest with the tobacco. Pinching the assortment of parts that will make the cancer stick between his thumb and forefingers, he rolls cautiously once, before the tips of his forefingers gently push at both ends of the paper, putting tobacco and filter closer to each other, rolling experimentally once again. Content now, he sets to forming the longish shape, the cut corners of the slip of paper on one side easing the endeavour. He thinks that it has to be a conditioned reaction by now to raise his eyes over the hands coming to his face when he makes to wet the gluey strip on the paper and finishes his cigarette.

Hal, as has become usual, is next to him, crouched against the wall of the Central City Police Department – he doesn’t know how it came that the man found him at his work, but he has and tends to join him during his lunchbreak and for his almost obligatory after-lunch cigarette.

Spring is in full swing and the outside is mostly comfortably warm by now, sun caressing their faces and skin even in their silence.

He lights the cigarette and…

Do Hal’s shoulders actually drop?

They don’t talk but Barry, with every other drag he takes from his cigarette, takes a look at the brunet and realizes that, indeed, the strain eases from his shoulders, his face relaxes and the slouch that his shoulders had pronounced before, vanishes from the stature of the other.

His break is over long before his mind – even as fast as it is – can come up with a valid hypothesis and only when the man is gone and Barry is back at work does it register that maybe smoking passively via Barry does relax the other man. There’s the theory of ‘living vicariously through others’ and even though it is largely untested that doesn’t mean it’s inconsequential. As a good scientist, however, he knows that every hypothesis needs proper examination, testing and observation.

And because, really, he doesn’t have anything else to do at the moment that is more pressing than this, he goes right about it.

 

-

 

It’s possible he’s been discovered.

Barry has made it a point during their last intermissions to give him poignant looks over the glimmering end of his cigarette as he takes a pull, long fingers wrapping around the lower half of his face, illuminating it in an orange glow should it happen to be dark around them, the shaking of his digits calmed – finally – if only for these few moments. Hal has observed that no matter what persona, Barry will never condescend to rolling his cigarettes at the speed available to him – much as the smoke and rancid, stale scent of it has started to calm Hal down from even the worst nightmares, it seems that the process is even more so meditative for the speedster.

Tonight, however, it has come to a head.

Because The Bat has confiscated Barry’s utensils for the Gala in honour of the JLA’s existence and Barry has been strung tighter than a Stradivarius and Hal, himself, has to admit that these things have never quite been his kind of gig – he feels stifled in the fucking penguin suit and under scrutiny as he feels; even amongst like-minded individuals.

They have to make a sight, he thinks oddly detached sometime in the night as he slips out through a door; Barry quietly vibrating at his side. It has to be bad if he can’t even contain his speed properly any longer like he usually is capable of doing.

Climbing the stairs, they make the roof and Hal… he’s been in on the conspiracy against Barry’s habit and because he derives just as much calm from watching Barry’s hands shaping around the paper-slips and the filter, taking in the pale lips wrapping around the cool end of the cigarette, he’s come prepared. For some reason no one filched him, suspected him of being complicit to Barry’s addiction.

“Oh my god.”—the blond groans when he steps through the door and promptly slumps against it, city stretching out in front of them, quiet in the summer. “I’m going to die.”

Hal can’t quite bring himself to answer, but he reaches for his inside pocket and folds his hands carefully around the small leather bag he has bought because… well, it’s inconspicuous enough and he thought why not. When he offers it to the slump-crouched figure of the blond, what he gets is a look somewhere between grateful-surprised. He smiles; still mute and keeps the steady hand held out in the direction of his friend.

Barry takes the pouch and… “Fuck, Hal, you’re a Saint.”

He’s really not, because Barry’s beautiful hands framing the dark-red leather and its contents is going to be an image he’ll be retaining and thinking of a little more than the others he has stored away in the next few days, but that’s okay for now. Barry needn’t know.

And when the smoke rises from between the sigh-parted lips of the blond, his eyes closing in relish Hal can’t deny that even this makes a pretty picture he might be keeping.

“Sit down, you’re going to have nothing of it otherwise.”—because as it turns out, he hasn’t quite been found out after all, so who cares if he indulges a little while longer?

 

-

 

Since The Bat – obviously – knows what has happened, Hal finds himself to be Persona Non Grata with the man which pushes him more firmly into Barry’s corner, wearing thin around the edges when nothing he actually does turns out to be _right_ and The Bat won’t give him orders he can properly follow.

It ends in disaster;  
the likes of which sends Green Lantern off planet and The Bat back to Gotham, huffing and puffing like the big bad wolf he has made himself out to be.

Barry finds himself grabbing for the tobacco a lot more often than he would have before; it’s a known coping mechanism – the smoking in stressful situations; it’s how he made most of his exam-weeks (Cigarettes and Red Bull, _not_ the best combination but it kept him awake and mostly functional) – but he doesn’t like it and, what is worse, it comes to a point where even his colleagues who would usually never comment on the addictions of each other – so long as they’re not an actual impeachment to their chosen professions in the name of the law and their city – openly mention it to him.

Having generally uninterested people talk to you about the small red, leather pouch – Hal _left_ it in his flight, Barry… doesn’t know what his fingers did, but he has it now – in the back-pocket of your jeans is… uncomfortable at best and given the fact that, even with his increased intake, he doesn’t actually feel any better about his ritual, Barry becomes a little prickly about the subject.

It’s not, however, until a month in when Hal still hasn’t returned and Barry’s ire finally finds its way right back into the face of the man who caused it that the speedster has to actually sit down and ask himself what exactly is wrong – because something has to be if The Flash is dressing down The Bat.

And the answer, as obvious and simple as it is, is supremely uncomfortable.  
Because right now he cannot do a single thing about it.

Hal is gone.

 

-

 

Even as unaware as he is about the time he’s missed on Earth, Hal knows that his days as The Renegade… have to be over. He’s encountered The Spectre and he knows that while it might be a future for him at some point… that is then and this is now and there is something else he needs; a wrong that he can right. Has to – even.

The Watchtower catches him first on his return to Earth and while he is surprised to find The Bat there, it is not News to him that Barry has taken a turn for the worse. It appears that the speedster has gone as far as to tear the man a new one – Hal would have liked a front-row seat, it’s too bad actually.

“You deserved it.”—is all he tells the Caped Crusader; expecting the downturn of the lips. Hal shrugs with Gallic levity and gives the man a cocky smirk that he hasn’t felt on his face for too long a time. “You were an ass. Somebody was going to – you’re lucky it was by the hands of The Flash; who know what would have happened if Big Blue lost his patience with you.”

World War Three.  
They know.  
They’ve been there – it’s not worth a repeat performance.

The Bat doesn’t answer and leaves but when Hal moves to do the same, he is surprised to find Canary and Arrow in the corner of the room assessing him with, for the male, unusual quiet before she nods and leaves.

Insert the sarcastic slow clap from the archer before: “If you ever hurt him like that again there is not going to be a planet that will save you from the arrow that is coming for your head.”

He nods slowly and carefully, knows that the man isn’t lying either – heaven and earth will already have been moved by the time Oliver Queen would be coming for him and Hal doubts that blond would let a lot of things come between him and his target; he can be anal like that. Barry has good friends looking out for him.

But when he turns to leave, The Arrow holds him back with one last parting word: “Make sure he gets some sleep though, yeah?”

 

-

 

What with Hal gone, Barry had – about two weeks in – made his first trip to Coast City in order to have a look around and let the people know that even if their resident Lantern was not around, they had no reason to fear. While he was certain that, for the people, it was a good thing, The Flash could wear himself thin running between crises of the two cities and there have been weeks in the last few months in which his mind could simply not bear to shut down at night even with the amount of cigarettes that he _takes the time_ to roll. It’s not the same, smoking them without Hal next to him.

He feels worn.  
If this is how Hal has felt after Parallax it’s no wonder he’s chosen Barry’s quiet addiction over actually socialising with people who could – indeed – have helped.

That is not to say that Barry is slacking – because he’s a stubborn son of a mother and no way is he going to (a) let on that he’s an emotional wreck or (b) live in a pigsty (even though he honestly wants to just drop everything where he is most of the time) just because the man his heart has sneakily enclosed in it against his brain’s better advice is gone.

Imagine his surprise when Hal Jordan, jeans, flannel shirt and leather air-force jacket, fetches him early from work with an honest-to-god glare at his superior when the woman opens her mouth to say something about his work-hours (technically he’s been working overtime recently) and an arm that wraps possessively around his shoulders and pulls him into the warm, comfortable, broad side of the brunet as he steers him down the hallway.

His brain is shouting expletives at the heart in his chest that tries to jump through his ribcage and into the hands of the other man – it doesn’t want to believe that the effort is futile due to physical limitations.

They’re outside before Barry’s brain catches up on the fact that… they are actually leaving and shouldn’t he say something?

“What?”—his mouth and vocal chords offer and… no, his brain is disappointed but his heart beats a little faster when Hal turns his face to give him a soft smile and the hand around his shoulder slips to cup his neck and pull him flush up against his body in a mostly innocent embrace. If it weren’t for the lips pressed to his temple.

“’m sorry I left.”—he mutters, his voice vibrating through his chest and into Barry where it drips honey over the cracks in his psyche. His heart lets his brain know that it’s an actually quite feasible comparison considering that honey has antiseptic properties; his brain gives up. “You need a break.”

He doesn’t argue.  
He’s just a little confused when the larger hand of the other man drops down to his and, squeezing it, brings his fingers up to his lips, pressing a soft kiss to them. “I really missed your hands though.”

Well, his brain thinks, at least _that_ part makes sense now.

“I have your pouch.”—his lips offer and his brain is actually quite content, this is conversation, this is good. Well done; he appears almost properly human right now.

Hal’s lips part from his fingers, splitting in a small grin. “Keep it; the red suits you better anyways.”

His cheeks endeavour to prove the brunet right.


	7. ... the one where Barry says No to the JL and it intrigues Hal (T)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> ... in which Barry can't afford the Justice League and needs his day-job to survive

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So, this is it - this story marks the end of my thesis-inforced hibernation - I am now free to pay more attention to the rest of my stories :) Yay for me, yay for you, please leave comments via didgeridoo (sorry it just rhymed, you don't have to get a didge, just... leave a comment, thanks)

+++

 

They are still _fresh_ when news of The Flash reaches them and there isn’t even a discussion amongst the Big Three about whether or not to go for it. Maybe there should be – have been – but when not even The Bat makes to veto a speedster on their humble, but growing, team of heroes, Hal figures there must be a reason for it. He may be a loudmouth, but he’s not _stupid_ – most of the time – and because he could see Central City practically from his back-yard if he wanted to, he gets on the small convoy to the meet-up.

The Flash finds them barely five minutes into their waiting; a game that The Bat has been adamant about with just about every Hero they’ve recruited until now. Hal doesn’t yet know what it’s supposed to be good for, but he is – personally – astounded by the quick arrival of the man in red.

“You’ve wasted your time.”—is the first thing that he hears by the means of vibrating vocal chords that carry the voice that might be youthful or old; the man gives nothing away. “I have no interest in being in your Club.”

Big Blue tilts his head, slightly affronted in a way that really might just dampen the whole bright day, but floats forward either way, hands opened in a placating manner – a gesture that indicates their willingness to negotiate. “Hear us out first.”

The man in red shakes his head and when he speaks next, the vibrating vocal chords are gone, leaving the voice of a younger man, melodious and beautiful, but strong and convinced in what he says. “I do regret, but I can’t.”—his posture is just as unassuming as that of the blue behemoth would be.

In the background The Bat crosses his arms over his chest in a slightly _more_ affronted manner and Hal gets the impression of a child stomping its foot when the man gruffly bites out: “You are good. We could need you.”—it feels like it’s wrenched from between his lips and given that it’s actual _praise_ , Hal would not be surprised.

Even so the other man shakes his head. “As much as I do thank you for the compliment you misunderstand my motivations when I say I have no interest.”—his voice gets a little sassy as he continues, “But I am a simple man. I have neither the freedom to come and go as great reporters do, nor do I have millions at my hands. I need to earn my due and being The Flash is already stretching my earnings.”

“We could help…”—Superman cuts in, eager at having found a point to hook in, passing by the comment that Hal _knows_ has been a slight to his true identity; by the way The Bat turtles up, so has he.

“And at what cost?”—the red speedster replies. “Leaving my city for weeks – months – at end for a mission you deem more important than the roof over my head or the food on my table. You might not think about it, but I have an increased metabolism that needs to be paid and, as such, I cannot afford to go missing because one of you decreed it so. What you are asking of me would be the ruin of you, my city and me.”

Hal notices that he is putting himself last; he notices that he has actually _prepared_ an answer; he has thought this through – and he has intel on them that none of them were prepared for.

The kid is _good_ – he gives him that – but he has also thought about it and so, when he steps forward, it is to offer him a small communicator that is his design solely. “It is not the pest, nor will it eat your harvest.”—he snarks good-naturedly when the speedster won’t even look at it. “I understand what you’re saying – and it’s a good argument that we’re not going to poke holes in. Everyone has their reasons.”—he offers the communicator up either way. “This is _me_. I am from Coast City and if there is a moment when your roof _leaks_ , do call.”—he doesn’t doubt the kid gets the metaphors as he reaches for it.

Something tugs at his lips, but instead of giving in to the words, he spreads them into an impish smile, fingers picking at the communicator. “I am not watering your flowers when the pineapples get to you, soldier.”—he warns and Hal… is not surprised that he knows his own identity just as well.

“Haven’t been on the ground, running, for a long time, kid.”—he notices the man doesn’t contest the nickname even as he floats away to join the rest of the waiting crew. “See you, ‘round.”

“Happy Hunting.”—the man calls back, but it’s a sound already distorted by speed and they are treated to a streak of red disappearing back into the city and out of their sight.

Hal thinks he would do great in the League.

 

-

 

“He knows your identities.”—Green Arrow snaps somewhat impatiently upon hearing the recount of their meet-up with The Flash; blue eyes blaze behind the mask. “And you let him _walk_?”

The last part, especially, is directed at The Batman who seems to have been stuck in a perpetual man-sulk ever since the young speedster had decided to negate their offer; the man has been non-verbose ever since and Hal is not surprised when the supreme Archer does not get a reply.

“This is dangerous.”—he growls, already reaching for his weapon of choice. “Who knows what he could do with it.”

Hal divines his plan before the blond can even stand up and, snapping his hand around the wrist of the archer – gently; he needs his fingers to remain not-broken – indicates for him to wait a little.

“He’s known for a while now.”—he starts and the blond does, indeed, listen – surprisingly – as Hal, who had been quiet until now, adds his thoughts on the meeting. “He’s known about the League for a while now and he’s known that we’re recruiting.”

Diana nods opposite of him, quietly agreeing. Hal takes it as a Go Ahead.

“His answer was premeditated and given before we could even ask. I would not be surprised if the speed – as he has it – would affect his mind and brain-capacity just as it does the rest of his body; give him enough clues and he is going to sort through that puzzle just as quick as a computer would. Therefore… yes, he is potentially dangerous.”—he gives the room a thorough look, “As are any of us so that should not be a reason to discount the fact that until now The Flash has proven to hold himself to an even stricter code of honour than most of us just because he told us _No._ ”

He turns to The Bat then: “He’s made a very good point too, you know.”

And this, finally, brings the brooding man out of his sombre mood with a rough sigh. “He did.”—he agrees begrudgingly. Hal wonders how much of his ego it costs him to laud a foreign man _twice_ on one day. “And we would do well to remember it too.”—he continues as he leans forward. “We are forgetting that even though some of us might have the capacities to work on a full-time agenda with the League, some might not; and may even be struggling with their day-to-day work, splitting personal life and chosen world. Already the second takes a lot of a person – as all of us know – but some more than others.”

He leans back then. “And he is also _right_ in bringing up the metabolism. We have _not thought about that._ ”

It’s a chastising tone as much as it is a grumpy one and the image of the stomping kid returns to Hal’s inner eye, even as he nods in agreement at the veiled message: in their endeavour to increase their numeral size, they have yet to think about the quality of their people.

“Well,”—he remarks almost jauntily, scratching his neck, “—we’re just figuring this out…”

They’re still new at this.

-

 

Nevertheless, Hal cannot quite cease thinking about the younger man even when he sits in his small apartment just a city over and because he’s not exactly useless – when he feels like it – he sits himself down and starts digging.

As it turns out The Flash originated in a mass-transformative event that he is surprised they haven’t been hearing more about – a particle-accelerator-malfunction at S.T.A.R.-labs, then still in firm hands with Lex Luthor, caused not only a city wide black-out but, consequently, a truck-load of Meta-human-sightings.

Given the fact that Hal is rather well aware of what accelerating matter could actually do to a human being – or to a sentient being in general – there must be something in the water over at Central for the repercussions to have been so mild. And yet he cannot believe that this would not have come up on their Radar. Wasn’t this why they had decided to band together? So these things could be properly managed – or even better: avoided at all?

And yet… The Flash, a Meta-Human created by The Shockwave just as many others, had decided to, as arbitrary as it sounds, use his powers for good and round up the renegades in an attempt to show the world that not all Metas are bad (there have started to be protests) and, according to his findings, support a vastly over-tasked police force in their endeavour to actually manage the growing threats that they were less and less equipped to deal with every time a new Meta showed up it seemed.

It’s the second thing that is beautifully detailed in the reports that Hal should not have access to, in the increasingly grateful – if begrudging at first – Newspaper articles, in the rising number of online forums putting as much history of the man together as possible for but normally privileged citizens. Hal reads – and learns – and realizes that The Flash must have good connections to the executive taskforce to be able to appear as quickly as he can.

Because he might currently be the fastest man alive, but even so he cannot – with a day-job that he defends so viciously – possess the ability to hear everything at once, to know everything at once. Unless, of course, the Big Ones passed by him regularly and in advance.

 

-

 

Hal grins coquettishly at the young speedster when he sees him again, a week after their first encounter under the watchful eyes of what has just officially become the Justice League – their first big gig under their belts and _Brain_ safely put behind bars. To celebrate away from home – because he knows all the bars there and they know him and it can get really awkward – he has decided to step out in Central and look who has decided to join the world of the living weekenders.

The Flash is stopping a Bank-Robbery at Main when Hal enters the scene from a side-street and finds himself smack dab in the middle of a classic hoe-down; with the difference that neither of the robbers do actually have any powers that might surpass mere human-beings and go down beautifully quickly before Hal can even properly look. The young man gives him a slight grin when he catches his mien and throws a thumb over his shoulder, voice calm and quiet.

“Can you watch them for the next few minutes? Police should arrive but I gotta hustle.”

Hal waves him away with a tiny groan. “You do you, kid. Go save kittens outta trees.”

And it’s not what he came here for, but he knows that The Flash has recognized the Green Lantern in his civilian persona – and has allowed him to help, no matter how small it actually is, even as he races off and Hal plonks himself down next to the tightly bound robbers with a soft sigh. He can’t help but think that he might like this becoming a part of a routine between them.

It doesn’t; unfortunately.

Because The Flash finds himself inundated in angry Meta Mobs that take up his time more than usual and even if Hal sometimes shows up in a haphazardly thrown together AF-gear that he still trusts the worth of to cover his back or even clean up, he is as stumped as the Speed Demon when it comes to the sudden deluge.

However this is how it gets better:  
Hal’s communicator goes off.

 

-

 

“Okay so I know you’re Hal Jordan and this is real stupid and I do not do my best work in the suit, so-”

The mask-hood comes off, revealing a young, blond man with piercing blue eyes that threaten death in his next sentence: “My name is Barry Allen and I swear to God if my identity gets out to even one of your contacts no matter their nature I will hunt you down; you won’t even see me coming. _Literally_.”

He must be twenty, at best; but Hal appreciates the pun at his own expanse. “Trust me to like my head a little too much to actually do that. Come on in, Barry Allen, make yourself at home.”

It’s a grand thing to say when the space that he can actually call _his_ consists of… well, two rooms and a balcony really. As Disney already poignantly put it early on in their filmography: _It’s barbaric, but – hey – it’s home._

Hal has barely turned around but he catches the last vestiges of a red blur, before being treated to a twenty year old awkward young man standing in his living-bed-room-kitchen in a white, holey T-Shirt, ragged jeans and converse.

“You are ten.”--it slips from his lips and the blond actually frowns, before a smirk catches his face.

“I am actually older than ten, but feel free to guess again while you help me figure out why the hell I’ve been a Meta Punching Bag more than usual for the last two weeks. My metabolism can’t keep up.”

It strikes Hal then that, while the Justice League has wanted The Flash precisely for his quick way of dealing with things, of figuring it out on his own and adhering to a Code of Conduct that almost puts The Bat’s to shame, for the man himself it might have been a thing born of necessity. Catching a bad-guy before the wind was out of the sails and he found himself adrift with no defences.

And around the blank slate of _Barry Allen_ , Hal constructs a first few cautious ideas.

 

-

 

“Barry” - Bartholomew Henry, and oh isn’t that a mouthful – Allen is a lot easier to find around the data-bases of the world than The Flash is, although he could slither through just as easily if not for the notes of various people on his exceptional intelligence throughout several mails, phone-calls, texts and other communication appliances Hal _really_ shouldn’t have any access to.

_The Bat is worse than NASA. Pass it on._

But he finds the kid and – yeah – he’s probably pushing the legal-limits just about everywhere; Hal wouldn’t be surprised if cashiers still asked the man for identification if ever he happened to buy House Warming Gifts that turned out to be alcoholic. On the other side, however, despite his proven _young_ adulthood, the man had been hired by the CCPD straight out of college; paid internship, but nevertheless. It’s more than a great deal of the man’s former class-mates can say of themselves and judging by the case-load that passes the desk of the Forensic Scientist on a bad day Hal would say they have yet to regret their choice – it’s no wonder that he, maybe, gets a little more leeway with his abrupt absences than other employees of the state would.

However Hal keeps it clean.  
There is not a single word of The Flash to any of the other Justice League members and Barry Allen might as well not exist to the Green Lantern. They get by – mostly.

 

-

 

The thing is that even as they get closer personally, The Flash adheres to a certain set of rules as Barry is quick to explain to Hal over one of their first pints of beer that he doesn’t feel too bad about offering because… well, Barry drowns it in one go, remains slightly happy for the next 0.45 minutes and then returns to the cool level-headedness Hal has come to know. Must suck being twenty-two and unable to drink yourself to the grave if you so desired; but he’s digressing.

There are rules to The Flash. And the first one is to never talk in a way that could be identified. “It’s just annoying to talk with vibrating vocal chords.”--the younger man admits then, massaging his throat with a distasteful moue, before a slight blush forms on the bridge of his nose and his grin turns positively stupid. “Kinda feels like too much a mouthful.”

And Hal swears that the only reason his own beer is not gracing the polished wood of the bar is because he’s survived Oa knows how many years in military services and while he’s never quite been a fan of such talk, he’s come to get used to it. Swallowing around the next sip of beer is still thing of demonstrative beauty.

Rule No. 1 is closely followed by: “Don’t let yourself be identified by a person whose background you are unfamiliar with.”--which Hal, personally, chalks up to Barry being a slight bit paranoid about the make-shift-family he’s found himself after losing his natural parents in a shit-storm that the speedster himself, even after all these years, cannot make heads or tail of despite having ground stone on the case for longer than he could remember.

“Had to give it up.”--the blond says on the evening of what Hal would later learn was the anniversary of him witnessing the murder of his mother and consequent imprisonment of his father wherein he would lose his life just barely a week later in a prison riot. “I could make myself go crazy; walking circles, put the clues together in any possible direction, finding new leads, finding dead leads, keeping up the life in between.” The man shakes his head as he reaches for the bottle of beer they’ve been sharing – it’s Hal’s last and because Barry doesn’t necessarily feel it he’d been reluctant about claiming it for himself entirely.

“When I became The Flash I thought about picking it up again.”--he admits into the quiet several breaths later. “Figured now that I was new and improved something would reveal itself to me like magic.”

Hal realizes that despite the wording… Barry had indeed gone and tried; not just thought about it. But the man doesn’t elaborate and so he doesn’t push; he might be good at that in the field, but it is something else with people. He has his fair share of trauma and general dreams/events/what-have-you that he’s certainly not going to talk about anytime soon with anyone so long as he can help it.

But again – this is but a side act. Barry is horribly protective of the old couple that has taken him in when he was sixteen, too old for many other families who would have liked to adopt, and gave him a world that he had sincerely dreamed of but never thought would be available to him. And so he knows who The Bat is, and he knows Big Blue and he knows their partners and friends – because he needs to.

“Take is as insurance if you want, but it’s a little more than that to me.”--and Hal just listens. “For me, knowing what – _who_ – is out there makes the world a little less big and a little less dangerous. I know the MOs of most of your crew simply to be able to identify them and then some. I have background intelligence on every villain I have ever crossed because I cannot afford putting the people I love in more danger than I already am.”

Because, as it turns out, Barry’s Folk are well aware – and wholly supportive – of The Flash which is a first for any superhero ever as far as Hal is informed and makes it that more clear just _why_ Barry would love to erect the Great Wall of China around his people and wouldn’t even regret it.

Yet again, however, it turns out that a valuable trait that the JLA had thought would be advantageous to have amongst them in the form of The Flash has been born out of necessity rather than anal-retentiveness (coughbatsycough) and the blank-slate around _Barry Allen_ has been filled with more information than he previously had, forming a mental image of the man who will blush from his own innuendos.

And Hal relishes in the closeness that he somehow manages to build with the usually reclusive young man who, as he soon learns, even has a reputation at his work for being (a) always too late to the scene but also (b) the best to the point of being likened to Sherlock Holmes and (c) the last to actually leave. Also Hal realizes that even though CCPD has put Barry in for an internship, there isn’t actually an active forensic scientist for Barry to intern for. Which means that the young man has use for his speed even when The Flash has had a calm day what with him needing to zap from one corner of the city to the other within mere minutes – and that is discounting the work with mostly decrepit machinery.

“I may sometimes get fed up with the centrifuge and do it myself.”--the blond concedes one evening when Hal has picked him up from work for a night off after he’s just returned from yet another mission in Space.

_Barry does water his flowering cacti. They don’t speak of it._

So when it becomes clear that Barry, for all his speed, has but a minimal knowledge of actual face-to-face combat save for – _hit them where it hurts, which: yeah, Arya Stark_ – it’s no hardship at all to pick up that particular slack.

 

-

 

“Is this you working off some frustration on poor old me?”--Barry smiles teasingly at him, when Hal pulls him onto the large training mats he has been holding on to from his days as an active Air Force Member.

He will admit that looking at Barry’s beautiful form moving through whatever masses they’ve decided to brave for their mutual day off – it happens once a week, somehow – has become something of a favoured passing of time recently. It’s not hard to either, considering that the beautiful hide actually belongs to an intelligent and frankly perfect being.

And yes, maybe, he’s a bit frustrated – because he has learned that he cannot remain a constant in Barry’s life without finding in him an outlet for the actual Hal Jordan that has, officially, fallen off the Earth’s face a few years ago when the ring first found him. Which means that, _yes_ , he may have it a little worse for Barry Allen than he might have thought possible.

Even so he shakes his head, and holds his palm out invitingly. Barry heeds his silent invitation, edging around the borders of the mats.

“This is me making certain that, increased healing or no, you actually know how to land a punch.”--he corrects; it’s mostly the truth after all. If he gets to feel the blond up a little while he’s doing it… well, they’ve been kind of dancing around each other for months now. Barry with his blushing innuendos, Hal with his staunch military-enforced-stoicism and loud looks – he knows how close they are to a precipice that he only now starts doubting.

The blond sighs, but steps closer, bare feet pressing into dark-blue. It strikes Hal that the man is actually not even dressed in things that belong to _him_ rather than to Hal – and he wonders if he can get away with backing out now.

But Barry’s face reddens with his smug smirk and Hal knows that whatever comes next, it will cause him to stay firmly planted where he is and get his hands on that man – curse the consequences.

“Teach me, sempai.”

_He’s going to kill the little shit, but it’s going to be amazing._

 


End file.
